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BREEDING AND REARING 



OF 



THE SILK WORM. 



A FEW HINTS 



FARMERS OF THE SOUTH. 






\> v 



BY L. S. CROZIER. 



C O P Y RIGHT SECURED 
L. S. CKOZIER. 




NEW OELEANS: 
PRINTED AT THE DEMOCRAT OFFICE. 

1880. 



S" £ 

C°i$ 



BREEDING, BEARING 



AND 



CULTURE OF SILK WORMS. 



PREAMBLE : 

Is there any need for me to demonstrate the immense advantage of the 
silk worm? These are too generally known, and the limit of this small 
treatise too narrow for me to explicate at length on that part of the sub- 
ject. I will content myself with having you to observe that this culture- 
brings into existence numberless first-class industries, and imparting 
life and motion to all those great or small, already established in the 
country, and to the agriculture as well, by drawing and settling in the 
country a considerable population of workmen and traders who con- 
sume the products of the farmer, and constitute at his very door a per- 
manent market, by reviving and increasing the commercial movement 
in all its various branches, by bringing in the cash capital and increas- 
ing four -fold the value of land. There is not one person in the country 
who can remain unconcerned in the progress of silk culture ; not one but 
has a strong interest in it. The rich will find there a profiable use for 
his funds ; the workman a steady employment ; the mining industry a 
powerful help on account of the large amount of fuel used in the factory 
and spinning mills, and the farmer a sure resource. 

One of the peculiarities of this industry is its aptitude to be divided 
and sub-divided indefinitely. Silk is like a precious manna, which 
every one may gather according to his strength and ability to work. 
There is even something more than this, for the poor can reach to it as 
easy and more surely than the rich, for experience has proven, long 
ago' and everywhere, that breeding on a small scale is almost always a 
sure success, and at all events runs much less risk than breeding on a 
large scale, which is the more exposed to disease as the worms are 
more in number. Another advantage of a limited breeding is, that it 
requires scarcely any expense. Every year, a few weeks in the smallest 
cottage with an acre or two of young mulberry trees, one will make 
first $50 then $100 or $400 worth of cocoons,' without neglecting the 
other culture, bring into usefulness the girls, children and the old dur- 
ing the first stage, and men only for eight or ten days, when the work 
needs hurrying. Then money will come, truly a discovered treasure 
for the poor family, coming in so fast it will seem as if it had been 
dropped directly from above. And why should we not see done here 
what we see done in France '? There even the highly educated ladies 
participate in this interesting business, as they would in a plaything 
making, at the same time realizing a nice little profit of $90 to $100 or 
more. 

To sum it up : Breeding on a small scale is so easy that in silk grow- 
ing countries you see it multiply indefinitely and become the true 
source of wealth, for they make at least three-fourths of the general 
production of silk. 

For more extensive breeding, which needs costly buildings and other 



Rearing and Breeding 



expenses, though it requires more care, more practical instruction, 
and is more exposed to failure than limited breeding ; it is likely to suc- 
ceed better here than in any other place in the world owing to the 
remarkable qualities of the climate. Further, it is useful and indis- 
pensable to impart impulse to industry and to spread it in a new country. 
It is not expected from a poor farmer to go into planting mulberry trees 
and raising silk worms in a country where he supposes there is nobody 
to buy his cocoons, because he does not know that he who has cocoons, 
secures the whole Avorld for his market ; that should his country refuse 
to buy them, Italy, France, Spain and even England will always send 
hun gold for his goods. This the rich man knows, and he is to set an 
example and take the lead. When the most intelligent, the most de- 
voted to public progress and their own personal benefit have seen and 
handled the results and proved how easy and surprising the success is 
which await them in that direction, it will then happen with the cul- 
ture of the silk worm in America, as it happened in France with the 
culture of the potato, tame grasses, etc., once so difficult to introduce, 
and which afterward spread so rapidly, becoming a great resource for 
the whole world. I say it will be the same story again with the silk 
worm in Louisiana, Mississippi, etc. 

The experiments made at Silkville with the breeding of silk worms, 
have already proven how particularly adapted to that culture your cli- 
mate and soil are. By erecting his factory for milling and reeling, M. 
de Bossiere, will go one step farther, and set up in your midst a ready 
market, even in advance of the production, so that the most obstinate 
cannot preserve the slightest objection to oppose. As for me, I shall 
feel happy and proud to tiring ail the intelligence and strength I may 
have to help this important enterprise and make it a final success. 
This I shall do with entire confidence, for with a leader so enlightened, 
so alive to the interests of all, and at the same time so resolute, with the 
abundant means at his disposal, and above all that, with a nation so 
full of intelligence and instruction, so anxious of improvements as the 
one we live with, the success is assured. I mean success in establishing 
and spreading the culture of both, mulberry and silk worms ; as for the 
success of the crop, three years' experiments have thrice proved how 
easy it is. 

THE MULBERRY TREE. 

It being proved by facts that the naturalization of the silk industry in 
this country is not only possible, but even easy and economic, more so 
than in any other region of the world. Persons desirous of engaging 
in the silkworm business must, first of all, plant mulberry trees. A 
regular cocoonery need not be erected till the trees have grown up 
larger, the small temporary accommodations that may have been used 
are no longer spacious enough to hold silk worms. In the Mississippi 
valley buildings are plenty. 

The mulberry tree belongs to the Urticn family ; its flowers are monoic 
and dioir, disposed in close spike, oval or elongated, of which the females 
grow into compact juicy berries, containing the seed. Many (authors) 
writers say it originated in China, still it grows spontaneously in Persia, 
India and many other places in Asia, as well as in North America. 
There are two kinds or varieties quite distinct; the black mulberry tree 
and the while mulberry tree. The black one to the family of which the 
American belongs, vieds a great variety of excellent fruit. The leaves, 
strictly speaking, might be fed to the silk worms, still they are coarse 
and tough, and the worms do not eat them readily Those fed on them 
exclusively yield an inferior quality of silk. The white mulberry tree 
will grow fifty or sixty feet high with a trunk four to eight feet in cir- 
cumference. The leaves, which produce the most beautiful silk, are 
alternate glossy on the upper side, smooth on both sides, oval, tough, 
with a little heart-shaped cut at the base, denticulate on the edge, often 
too, diversely divided in lobes when the tree grows wild, and whole on the 
grafted varieties. Sometimes on the same tree, no matter of what vari- 



of the Silk Worm. 



ety it is, leaves are found of different shapes. In color, the berries pre- 
sent numberless shades, from pure white to most perfect black. Fowls 
and pigs grow fat on them. Sweeter than raspberries, they taste agree- 
ably when mixed with them. 

The second leaves, gathered and dried in the fall, form a first class 
f|dder for all herbivorous animals ; green they are eaten still more 
readily. 

The wood of the white mulberry tree has a fine compact grain, nice 
citron-yellow colored, and apt to take a beautiful polish. These qual- 
ities make it fit for several different uses ; cabinet-makers, cartwrights 
and coopers work it to advantage. It has, too, a well deserved reputa- 
tion for fence posts and vine stakes, lasting very long in the ground. 
For kegs and barrels it is as good as the best oak. The bark of the 
young limbs yield a kind of tow, smooth and pretty near as fine as 
silk. Olivier de Serre, the father of French agriculture, had some 
tablecloths worked out of it, worthy to be presented to Henry IV., his 
king and friend. Out of the same bark the Chinese and Japanese make 
the most strong and beautiful paper. As an ornamental tree the mul- 
berry cannot be beat. Its natural tall bearing fits it nicely to border 
roads and public grounds, while with suitable pruning it will submit to 
any shape wanted, bower, hedge, etc., and more than all that, its 
growth is rapid ; it stands the drouth so well that no other tree can be 
compared to it in that respect. For these many reasons the mulberry 
tree ought to supersede as ornament and shade tree quite a number of 
other kinds which are badly wanting in usefulness Gay, healthy 
foliage, so reposing to the eye, succulent berries, a delight of your 
children and birdies, without recalling to y<5u its immense practical 
utility for the silk culture. Do not these points entitle it to a place of 
honor around your cottage ? Plant mulberry trees then, men of the 
South, give it its due of care, and —my word for it— you will be paid for 
your trouble a hundred fold. See next chapter how to do it. 

THE MULBERRY TREE PLANTATION AND CUL- 
TURE. 

The mulberry tree is propagated from seed, cuttings and layers. 
From seed the trees are hardier and live longer, but they are born wild. 
and bring forth so many different varieties that out of a hundred there 
are not twenty alike. Very good stock has been sometimes obtained 
from seedlings, but, as a rule, they need to be grafted. We want two 
good points in a mulberry tree for our purpose, viz : good quality of the 
leaves and facility in gathering them. This implies large, soft, tender 
leaVes, growing on long, smooth shoots without side twigs. This is 
very important, for on a good tree a man acquainted with that work 
could pick 100 pounds of leaves in one hour's time, while, on the other 
hand, some trees present such small tough leaves, and so very hard to 
pick, that it is better to let them alone and save time, except if it hap- 
pens to be on the very first stage of growth, both of the worms and 
leaves ; these last are then tender enough to be fed to the tender worms. 
Young, tender leaves are milk for them, leaves of wild mulberry trees 
are desirable too, for the first meal after every moulting period, which 
is a critical time for the worms, who, somewhat indisposed yet, need 
food fine and light, for which they show a marked preference. Since, 
then, that seedlings are not to be'relied upon in that respect, it is nec- 
essary to set the largest number possible of grafted or selected trees in 
view of economy and facility in breeding. The mulberry tree may be 
grafted or budded ; the graft is either cleft or flute, the first one being 
seldom adopted. The flute graft is easiest and succeeds best. It is 
practicable from April to August. A smart man can set from 250 to 300 
grafts a day. 

Whereas the white mulberry tree succeeds admirably from cuttings, 
the silk growers of America will do well to adopt that way of propaga- 
tion to procure their stock, provided they take the cuttings from good 



6 Rearing and Breeding 

trees, possessing all the qualities described in this chapter ; in that case 
there is no use for grafting. 

The ground being prepared by deep plowing and harrowing, take 
your cuttings, make ready beforehand (we make them six or eight 
inches in length,) and set them three or four inches apart, in rows three 
or four feet distant. Two precautions are to be remembered. First. 
to press the ground firmly around the lower end of the cutting, and t<f 
cover the upper with but one-half or one inch of mellow earth, to alle- 
viate the effects of a possible drouth, and to protect the upper eyes 
against the rays of the sun. Between the rows run the cultivator, but 
not so close as to hurt the young plants. There will be some work left 
for the hoe and hand, killing the weeds, always taking great care not 
to disturb the young roots, or to break the tender buds. 

Layers are made by bending on the ground one or more shoots of the 
selected mulberry trees. These are pegged in the bottom of small 
ditches two or three inches deep, then covered with earth to the same 
depth. In that way often out of every bed springs a rooted tree. 
Layers are laid in February, March or April, always as early as prac- 
ticable. They are severed from the parent tree by a cut in the fall, and 
planted out the ensuing spring, according to climate and country. 

One thing ca,nnot be too much insisted upon regarding the planting 
of mulberry trees : it is to plow the ground as deep as possible before 
setting the trees. It is a work that will be repaid a hundred-fold by 
the more rapid growth, by a larger yield in much less time, and by a 
superior quality of the leaf, producing in turn a superior quality of 
silk, and last, not least, by the longer life of the trees, which, as a 
precious inheritance, shaU go down to future generations. There is 
one more reason for doing it in this climate : deep plowing will 
retain more moisture in the soil, and give the wood a chance to grow as 
late as September, instead of being stopped by the drouth in July or 
August, as it often does. 

WILD MULBERRY TREES. 

It is well, on the start of breeding, to have a few wild mulberry trees 
set in hedge in a sunny corner, sheltered from the north behind a wall, 
if possible, and trimmed every year close to the ground. The leaves 
being earlier, it affords a facility to have the worms hatched earlier too. 
The necessity of early and rapid breeding is greater here than it is in 
France, for a reason that requires some explanation. When the berries 
begin to ripen, the leaf is said to be done, which means that it has 
attained its full maturity ; it then grows too tough for the worms to eat 
well, and, besides, develops itself into a side twig, which makes the 
picking .very difficult, and hurtful to the tree by tearing the bark. 
Hence the importance to have the worms keep pace with the leaf, and 
be done eating within the very short period of softness of the latter. 
The more so, because the last stage of the breeding is a time of great 
hurry, when facility in rapid picking is particularly desirable, the 
worms eating more and more as they grow larger. By using early 
leaves of wild mulberry trees, as aforesaid, eight valuable days can be 
gained. Another advantage of an early start is to be through with the 
whole breeding before the hot weather sets in, which, though tem- 
pered by a ceaseless wind, causes a number of inconveniences. These 
are avoided by pushing and forwarding the growth of the worms by 
all available means, and this is one of the best. 

These wild trees may be set one and one-half or two feet apart, and 
only as many as may be wanted to start the worms, or for a small 
experimental breeding. 

Mulberry trees are trimmed in three different ways— dwarf, medium 
trunk, and high trunk or standard. 

DWARFS. 
If you mean business, and want mulberry leaves right away, make 
your land ready and set the trees in rows sixteen feet distant, and the 



of the Silk Worm. 



plants six feet apart in the rows. Form the crown of the tree by prun- 
ing or trimming it down one foot from the ground or close. Cultivate 
once with the plow between the rows, then with the cultivator as many 
times as is needed, the same as with corn. In that way two acres will 
feed enough of silk works to produce 145,000 to 150,000 cocoons, weigh- 
ing 1600 or 2000 pounds, according to quality— that is, after the third or 
fourth year from planting, according to quality of the ground, amount 
of care bestowed on the trees, etc. Besides, for a few years, the land 
between the rows may be planted with some crop, like potatoes, with- 
out any harm to the trees. It will pay both plowing and cultivation. 

MEDIUM TRUNKS. 
These are to be set fifteen or sixteen feet apart each way, trunks three 
feet high, in good ground. Each tree planted in that way, six or seven 
years from planting, will produce from thirty to forty pounds of 
leaves, 100 trees, representing a little more than an acre and a half of 
ground, would yield, say 4000 pounds of leaves, or 400 pounds of 
cocoons, which, at a dollar a pound, makes * 



HIGH TRUNKS OR STANDARDS 
Are generallv planted as border around the farm, as well as along the 
roads, around the house, or even in the open field, at thirty feet distance. 
In order to get a fine standard mulberry tree, it is to remain two 
years in the nursery without pruning. On the third year it is cut down 
close to the ground ; the finest shoot is then allowed to grow, which in 
Rood land will reach in one season from eight to ten feet in height. 
The fourth year it is cut back to six feet or so. Then the three or four 
buds on the' top only being left to grow, all the others are removed by 
passing the hand along the stem as many times as they grow again. 
The ensuing spring they are to be planted in holes Avide and deep. I 
would advise every farmer to set a row of them around his claim. Sup- 
pose 160 acres square, surrounded with standard mulberry trees, thirty 
feet apart, which makes eighty-eight trees for each side, or 352 for the 
four sides * when eight or nine' years old they will yield 100 pounds of 
leaves each, in all 35,200 pounds, enough to produce 1760 pounds of 
cocoons. I will suppose that they will be sold no higher than in France, 
which is seventy-five cents a pound, still it makes not less than $1320, 
costing not one* single kernel of wheat nor an ear of corn. Taking 
into account the enormous duties on foreign silks charged in this coun- 
try, I firmly believe that the American spinner will be able to pay 
for cocoons* a dollar a pound, without danger of loss ; they would then 
make $1760. You, who intend to beautify your homes, do you know 
among ornamental trees a kind that will make a more agreeable bor- 
dering than the mulberry tree ? 

PRUNING THE MULBERRY TREE. 
When intended for an ornamental or forest tree, the mulberry tree 
needs only a little trimming to train its trunk straight and rid it of its 
dead limbs. Not so, however, when the use of the leaf is contemplated. 
It needs then a thorough pruning at least every other year; first, in 
order to check its growth, for in a short time it would become impossi- 
ble to reach some of the highest or remote branches. A judicious 
pruning brinars together all the shoots within reach of the hand, 
strengthens the branches intended as steps to climb up the medium 
trunks and standards, and removes pendant branches that would be 
in the way. It is an occasion for mending injuries unavoidably done to 
the trees during the preceding picking of the leaves, and for preparing 
for the next picking, so that one man on well trimmed trees will do the 
work of two on ill-shaped and limb-crowded ones. The operation is 
done on one year or two year old wood, as the pruning is done yearly or 
every other year, by cutting the growth to be preserved back to four or 
five buds, and the shoots, always many in number, to be taken off 
close to the branch or trunk. The limb must present a smooth sur- 



8 Rearing and Breeding 

face, easily covered by the growing bark. In South France the pruning 
takes place with the picking of leaves, as soon as the cocoons are done, 
till the end of June. They strip the trees every year, but this is not 
advisable here, owing to the high price of hired Tabor and the many 
various occupations, which claim the time of the Southern farmer pre- 
cisely in that time of the year. He will then have to do what they can- 
not do in France, on account of the enormous price of the land. In- 
stead of one acre he will plant two, and let half of his mulberry trees 
go untounched for the next year, hatching just enough of silkworms to 
eat half of his leaves. The cocoons being done and sold, he will let his 
stripped mulberry trees put forth new leaves. Then in February and 
March, when he can hardly do anything else, he will take his pruning 
shears and remove the dead wood and bark and thin out the trees that 
have produced a crop the year before, and which, having a whole 
spring and summer before them to grow, will put forth branches so 
fruitful and in such number that he will have as many leaves on one- 
half as on the whole of his frees. These will thrive the better for that, 
and the work of picking be made easier, too, for I have explained it 
already, and you understand well that with smooth limbs quickly 
slipoed through the closed hand, without any fear of getting hurt with 
the dead wood, with leaves, large, thick and healthy, a man can fill his 
hand and bag four times as quick as one working cautiously amongst 
suckers half dried up and scarred at the preceding picking, bearing a 
few leaves here and there. We have tried that system in Silkville this 
year, and have made up our mind to stick to it henceforth. 

As for the young plants from cuttings, you will have to trim them 
only as you may want some leaves to experiment with, that is, you will 
remove all the small twigs that are eating up the main stem, and feed 
the leaves to a small quantity of worms, which may be bred and raised 
in your room in a box, always remembering to proportion the number 
of worms to the probable amount of food at your disposal. It will pay 
you fairly and initiate you into your future operations, by having you 
familiarized with the various transformations of that insect, better than 
you could be by going right away into wholesale breeding, for, in that 
way, you will have all the leisure you want to study well the precise 
moment of the beginning and end of the moulting period. And that is 
all you need know in this privileged climate which renders useless for 
you, so many cares and so much knowledge indispensable elsewhere. 

A clean and careful pruning, made with good and sharp tools, pre- 
sents so many advantages over that done carelessly and unskill fully 
that it is a point which cannot be too much insisted upon. A skilled 
hand will impart to the tree an elegant shape, manage steps for the 
feet, a prop for the back, or even a seat to rest on as the tree grows up, 
so that the man picking on the tree does more work, with less fatigue, 
than the one picki ng from the dwarfs, standing himself on the ground 
all day, with nothing but his legs to bear the weight of his body. The 
pruning-knife does the work very well, if sharp ; a good sized branch 
can even be cut with it, by taking the well known precaution to make a 
cut first on the upper side, then on the under side, bending at the same 
time the limb upwards, as the knife penetrates deeper into the wood. 
Still a pair of good pruning shears is by far to be preferred. Never cut 
in flute, nor far from the bud, if you have any regard both for your 
clothes and your trees. In France the cut wood does more than pay 
for the work. 

PRODUCTION OF THE MULBERRY TREE. 

Almost every new beginner's first question is : How many worms, or 
how many pounds of cocoons can be fed out of one acre of mulberry 
trees, the first year, the second, and so forth ? 

Count de Gasparin, an authority in silk culture, says : The first year 
let the tree make roots and grow ; the second year pick the leaves, and 
trim the trees carefully. The full production will be attained accord- 
ing, as follows : Dwarfs, planted four feet apart, give their maxima the 



of the Silk Worm. 



third vear after planting-, -and the maximum one acre can produce ; it 
last thirty years or more, according to the quality of the land. Planted 
eighteen feet apart they require five years to reach their maxima, last- 
ing sixty to eighty years or more. Planted twenty feet apart the maxi- 
mum is attained only ten to twelve years after planting, and so forth 
in the same proportion, till the distance of fifty yards apart. In this 
case the full production will come in one hundred years, and last at 
least sis hundred, as it is proven by our oldest trees- the first planted 
in France. 

I recommend planting in rows, twelve to sixteen feet distant from 
each other, the trees eight feet apart in the row. 

One acre of rnulberry trees in full production can feed 80.000 to 
100,000 worms, or from 300 to 500 pounds of cocoons, according to the 
care, climate and soil. 

SILK WORMS. 

There is nothing easier than to raise silkworms and get cocoons out of 
them. It is a mere pastime for school hoys, ladies or girls, as well as 
for men of leisure and science, ail equally fond of following clay after 
day the rapid progress, the astonishing metamorphoses, and last the 
wonderful work which precedes the transformation into chrysalis, 
in a silky grave, so well closed, so solid, that the greatest exertions, the 
sharpest finger-nails could not tear it open, though out of it emergen, 
apparently without effort, a tender and pretty white moth, the last 
metamorphosis of that insect. Schoolboys and learned men, too, have 
tried curious and sometimes cruel experiments on these harmless worms, 
such as to dip them in ice-cold water, to starve them during many days, 
or exposing them to a sunheat of 100°, and all that without being able 
to kill them, or prevent their spinning their skein, for the cocoon is 
nothing hut a mere skein, which is wound off from end to end with the 
greatest facility. Experimenting on very limited quantities of worms, 
learned men have sometimes, on the results so obtained, built up absurd 
and ruinous systems. There is no doubt but that the silk worms, when 
let alone on the mulberry trees, are hardier ami produce a finer quality 
of silk ; but the birds, mice, ants, spiders, etc., are against that mode of 
breeding, and make it impracticable. It is proved also that small 
breeding, of say fifty to three hundred pounds of cocoons, are a success 
next to infallible when undertaken with sound eggs, while large breed- 
ing requires particular conditions of space, ventilation and heat, more 
difficult to procure, but by the use of which admirable results are 
obtained. Very often a, favorable season brings together these condi- 
tions, and I have myself seen in my own house (in France) in one co- 
coonery thirty-three ounces of silk worm eggs yield us thirty-three times 
100 pounds of cocoons, which, being spun, produced 320 pounds of most 
beautiful silk. Now what affoixis me the most encouragement is the 
fact that the more I become acquainted with the Southern States, the 
more clearly I see them combine, year after year, regularly that temper- 
ature, those peculiar conditions, which, in France, have brought out 
years of memorable success ; conditions which breeders in less privi- 
leged climates can secure only by increased care and costly means. 
The good qualities of our climate do not require me to go into long and 
tedious particulars ; it will make your task and mine as simple and easy 
as possible. 

The most favorable conditions for the health of silk-worms are a dry 
atmosphere, plenty of air and warmth, and an abundance of healthy 
food. From May io to June 10 is a period which will soon be called 
here the cocoon season. I do not think that it is possible to better fill 
these conditions than our natural temperature does. The leaf partic- 
ularly is of a matchless beauty, and I have not the shadow 
of a doubt, not only of the success, but even of seeing all 
cocoons, no matter what breed they are, undergo here such improve- 
ment that they will be singled out on every market the world over, and 
bought at the highest figures, under the name of "Southern Cocoons." 

2 • 



10 Hearing and Breeding 



The marked superiority of our second crop over the first one, out of 
which it was bred, while the first was out o'f direct imported Japan 
eggs, affords a full evidence to the statement. Samples of four differ- 
ent breeds, white, yellow, green and crossed yellow and green, sent by 
M. de Boissiere to the Chicago Fair, attracted the attention of silk men, 
who were unanimous in pronouncing every type to be No. 1. M. de 
Boissiere has been complimented by the committee, and that must be 
for the whole country a precious encouragement. 

VARIOUS BREEDS OF SILK WORMS. 

There is in existence a boundless variety of breeds among silk 
worms, distinct of each other by the colors of the cocoons, or even the 
colors of the worms. 

There are, as for the color, three main divisions : white, yellow and 
green, with numberless shades. 

Aside from the difference in color the silk worms are said to be of 
three or four moul tings, according to the number of times they change 
their skin before they spin their cocoons, both living the same number 
of days, or, if you like best, eating the same number of meals, and 
both of fine quality, too. 

We find the Polyvoltines breeding sub-divided as follows : the Bivol- 
tines, hatching twice a year, the first time in April or May, like the 
other breeds, the second immediately after their eggs are made. The 
second breeding only gives eggs for the crop of the nest year. By no 
means can one keep the first for another spring ; they hatch or die 
soon after being made. Trivoltines hatch three times, giving three 
crops successively, the last only being good to be kept for next year. 
Quadrivoltines hatch four times, and the annual ones hatch but once. 
That would call for another division or distinction in Annual and Poly- 
voltines. 

Experiments have proved that the crop of Annual is much better 
than the many produced by the other breeds, Bivoltines, Trivoltines, 
etc., with much less trouble. 

As for the varieties of cocoons, they multiply with the propagation 
of the worms, and both color and fineness will change with the climate ; 
or, more accurately, the same breed exported to six different countries, 
would, in the lapse of a few years, show six distinct breeds, differing in 
fineness, color or shade at least. Such is the origin of the noted 
breeds: The Milanese Italian breed small, fine, yellow cocoons, the 
Ardeche (France) large yellow cocoons and the Brousse (Turkey), the 
unrivaled, white cocoons, of which nine pounds make one pound of 
silk, selling at $12 per pound, while the common kind averages twelve 
pounds of cocoons to one pound of silk, selling only at $8 per pound. 
Here we have a proof of the change alluded to. In Andrianople and 
Brousse imported yellow breeds grew pale more and more, till they 
now produce silk of the most beautiful white, used in its natural state 
for the richest and most inimitable fabrics (dresses). 

Nothing will be spared at Silkville, efforts or care, in securing and 
naturalizing the very best in the line of silky materials, and I believe 
our experience, climate and soil offer us a sure guarantee of success. 

SILK WORM EG-G-S OR SEED. 

We call (silk worm) seed the eggs produced or laid by that insect, 
when transformed into a moth. On the good quality of that seed suc- 
cess depends ; hence the solicitude bestowed on that object by the most 
enlightened men in the silk growing countries, more so where they 
have been afflicted by hereditary epidemic diseases. Science at last 
gave them, sure means to secure sound eggs, which, spite of the plague 
threatening to annihilate, that industry in Europe, yields now crops as 
bountifully as ever. Eggs or seed produced in such a healthy country 
as this, do not need the same minute care they require in less favored 
districts. The same processes, however, have to be followed exactly, 



affile Silk Worm. 11 



minutely, everywhere, in the preservation of these precious eggs, from 
the laying to the hatching, ten to eleven months. A few words only 
will be needed to convey the necessarv information. 

The silk-worm seed is round, slightly flattened, of lilac, violet, or 
dark-green color, according to the breed it comes from, and as small as 
turnip-seed. Some will stick wherever they have been laid by the 
female moth, as if glued on pasteboard, paper, cloth, or even the very 
cocoon. The seed of some breeds, on the contrary, will not adhere— 
such as some of Caucasus, Persia, and European Turkey, among which 
are the white of Adrianople, the yellow of Caucasus, from Nouka. 
The eggs are by natural law submitted to a period of seemingly life- 
less inaction, and so, during the whole summer, they will stand a 
degree of heat much greater than the one needed to hatch them in the 
spring. But from December it becomes possible, by giving them that 
same amount of heat, to secure a nearly perfect hatching. The exper- 
imental early winter breedings, so common in France and Italy, prove 
it every year. Therefore, if silk worms were kept in winter in a heated 
room, there is no doubt but what they would hatch or spoil. In ship- 
ping them by railroad or steamboat that same danger must be pre- 
vented, by not placing them in heated cars or too near the boiler. The 
most intense cold does not hurt them, and it would be better for them 
to be buried in ice than to remain exposed to a high degree of heat 
after the mouth of October. In order to avoid any excess, persons 
having a dry, well-ventilated cellar, will do well to hang their paste- 
board, paper, or cloth, if adherent, or in small bags if loose, with a 
string to a nail in the ceiling, taking care to pass the string through a 
bottle-neck or a piece of tin, to keep away the rats or mice. If tbere 
is no such cellar, the eggs may be kept in a cupboard, or, better still, 
hung in a room or half where no fire is made, or in any cool, dry and 
rat-proof place. Cloth used for bags must be clean. If loose seed is 
kept in tin or pasteboard boxes, holes must be provided to secure 
ventilation. Cool. dry. ventilated and rat-proof ; remember that. 

HATCHING. 

In all climates the time of hatching the eggs depends on the vegeta- 
tion of the mulberry tree. In Ardeche, for instance, they, wait till the 
leaf is at least the size of a silver half dollar, because there the 
weather iu May is usually cool and damp, sometimes even cold during 
the whole month, and the leaves grow slowly. I have seen the buds 
open in April, or even in March, yet the berries green as late as June 
and the leaf not fully formed as it needed to be to finish the breeding 
(or near the end of the breeding!. There then (in Ardeche i is no use 
for hurry, for the worms grow faster than the leaves, except in rare 
years, when fair weather keeps fixed, in which extraordinary results 
are obtained, asaforesaid. The South enjoys the rareadvantage of hav- 
ing that temperature every year. Whether sooner or later, as 
soon as the buds are seen to commence swelling, the eggs must be 
removed from the cellar and put in a room kept to the outdoor tem- 
perature. The same cause which makes flowers and grass come up 
will hatch your silk worms in the most safe and natural way. Be care- 
ful from the very start of the breeding that the temperature never 
descends too low during the night ; to prevent it put some wood in the 
stove before you go to bed, or, if more convenient, put the eggs in a 
basket on a white cloth, wrap a blanket around the basket and put 
between the blanket and the basket three or four bottles full of very 
hot water, renewing \he water in the morning till the warmt-h of the 
day makes itself felt again. 

Wherever the mulberry thrives it is possible to raise silk worms suc- 
cessfully ; it requires considerable more labor, expense and knowledge 
in cold and damp countries than in those having a temperature like 
ours. I shall therefore not speak of the various methods of hatching 
of several countries visited by me both in Europe and Asia. Remember 



12 Hearing and Breeding 

Well this : as soon as your eggs are set to hatching, whether it be by- 
natural heat or artificial means, keep them always between seventy- 
five and eighty degrees Fahrenheit. Experience will show you that it 
is an easy thing. Last spring I let my eggs hatch in my room, through 
which the kitchen stovepipe passes.* In daytime, about three or four 
o'clock p.m., the thermometer often rose to eighty-five ; in the morning 
it went down to seventy ; this was too much variation. I tempered this 
simply by putting some fire in the stove during the night. The heat 
of the pipe sufficed to preserve a moderate degree of seventy-five to 
seventy-eight, and the crop proved to be a splendid one. For the part 
of the eggs which were farther back than the rest, I used the system 
of the bottles to push them forward, and the thermometer never varied 
one degree by changing 1113' four bottles three times a day— the first 
from six to ten o'clock in the evening, the second from ten in the night 
to four, often three, in the morning, and from this last time till 
evening, owing to the warmth of the day, being exactly the same as 
the one I had given in the night. These produced a fair crop, too, the 
worms hatching in three clays. Finally, another part hatched without 
any care, at the natural temperature, and the cocoons were just as fine 
as the others, but they were eight days later than the rest. It is then 
best to help nature a little, particularly on the start, and during the 
course of the breeding, too, if a sudden extraordinary cold should come 
on, rather than to trust the weather to do the work. The expected 
goods will arrive so quick, and the pains to take are so little, that one 
would be very sorry to lose a crop, or part of it, just for neglect, even 
if it were but once in ten years. To keep the eggs in an apartment 
directly under the roof in the daytime, and in the bed with you 
during the night, is a means successfully used in such latitudes as ours. 
When the eggs are on the point of hatching, they undergo a marked 
change of color, they pass from dark lilac to ashy lilac, and become 
quite white when the "worm is out. 

IMPORTANT OBSERVATIONS. 

Before going further, I must give you a few notions intended to ex- 
plain a good many things, which you would understand with difficulty, 
or otherwise would want long and tedious explanations. 

They count five different ages in the life of silk worms, from the 
hatching, according to the number of times they change their skin. 
These ages, too, are termed molts, or sleep. The silk worms are 
equally said to be on the first, second, third and fourth moulting', as 
well as to sleep for the first, second, third and fourth time. 

The first age takes place between the hatching and the first moult- 
ing ; the second between the first moulting and the second ; the third 
from the second to the third moulting ; the fourth from the third to the 
fourth moulting, and the fifth and last extends from the fourth moult- 
ing to the "going up" or spinning of cocoons. 

Nature gave the worm the faculty of spinning the solid cocoon, in 
which it wraps itself , and of Avhich ' man makes such luxurious use. 
against all dangers that might hurt it as soon as it is transformed into 
a 'chrysalis, a state of insensibility which it preserves from eight to 
twenty days, according to breed and climate, before it emerges as a 
moth. The heaths or other branches disposed in cells, on which the 
worms climb to make their cocoons, imparted to that last moulting the 
name of "going up" (ascend.) 

One precious thing is, that the time which is to extend between the 
hatching and the "going up," depends entirely on your own will. The 
age of silk worms is counted by the number of meals they have eaten, 
and not by the days spent from their birth. They eat more or less, in 
proportion to the degree of activity imparted to them by the heat. At 
a cold temperature they are benumbed, and eat scarcely any. Hence 
that essential rule: In warm weather feed frequently. The more 
jrapid the .breeding, the sooner one is freed of the cares inherent to that 






of the Mk Worm. IB 



particular industry. Some leading breeders made an axiom out of the 
following" by-word : Give fire, air and leaf. Here in the South we will say ; 
Climate furnishes you with air and heat, feed oftener; as the heat in- 
creases, give more air, too. For the reasons given above, it is easy to 
bring to evenness a party of Avorms which took three or four days to 
hatch. You must separate day after day successively the wornis as 
they hatch, making as many divisions as they take days to hatch. 
Then take the first hatched and put them in a room less warm than 
that where the others are, and feed them only twice or three times a 
day ; meanwhile feed the others five or six times a day, till the second 
hatched overtake the first. They (the second) then join the first in the 
cool room, and are fed like them, but twice or three times a day, till the 
third, fourth, etc., pushed forward by warmth and numerous meals, 
come and join them successively, when they all may be treated to- 
gether at the regular allowance, both of food and warmth. They 
should all go through the moulting at the same time. 

HATCHING-TAKING UP THE SILK WORMS. 

When the eggs have changed color, and from violet have passed to 
light blue or an ashy color, according to the breed, they will soon hatch 
and need watching. Silk worms usually hatch from three to eight 
o'clock in the morning, and the taking up is to be done in one out of 
two ways, as the seed is loose or sticks to cloth, pasteboa.rd or paper. 

If the seed is loose, spread it evenly on a clean cloth in a box ; stretch 
above a sheet of tulle or perforated ' paper, to prevent the eggs from 
sticking to the leaves, and being lifted with the worms. Near five or 
six o'clock in the morning, if you see some hatched worms, lay softly 
on them (instead of loose leaves) whole young twigs, spacing them 
more or less to suit the quantity hatched. With these twigs, bearing 
two or three leaves, it is a great deal easier to move the minute and 
tender insects on the paper sheet, where they are to grow till the first 
age. 

At about eight o'clock or earlier, if the leaves have been rapidly 
covered with worms, the twigs, one by one, are taken up softly and put 
regularly spaced on a newspaper, or any other clean sheet of paper, 
taking care to leave a broad margin, for they grow very fast, and after 
every meal want more room. If there are worms left yet on the cloth, 
renew the leaves and take it up in the same way before you give a. 
second meal to the first, in order to keep them periectly even. When 
the last hatched have eaten their meal (of twigs), or better still, after 
the second taking up, leaves are chopped like course smoking tobacco, 
using a strictly clean and sharp knife, preserved expressly for that 
special use, and feed them to both parties together. 

That paper or box where you have just fed them, is then labeled No. 
1, first day. Those hatched the next day will be marked No. 2, etc. , to 
the end. According to the amount of care bestowed on the preserva- 
tion of the eggs, they will all hatch in two and three or eight days, and 
always in the morning. Those coming out at night or in the evening, 
are but few, and may be as well taken up or let alone to await for the 
others. 

Breeders like to hatch a few a couple of weeks in advance of the 
whole bulk in order to test the quality of the seed. 

EVENNESS OF THE SILK WORMS. 

Evenness in the worms is a matter of the utmost importance. 

First— The invieiv of the moultings. If your worms are very even, if 
they commence and finish their moultings altogether, at same time, 
when you remove their litter (which is necessary at least once before 
each moulting), all will keep at same time on the fresh leaves with 
which you are to take them up, and you need not to lose any ; on the 
other hand, if they are uneven, some being moulting, they will be 
buried and die in the litter beneath those who are eating, and it is in 



i-i Hearing mid, Breeding 

vain that you try to catch the right time to take up, you are sure to 
throw away part of them Avith the litter during the whole breeding. The 
trouble will keep growing all the while to the end, when some would 
be wanting a suitable place to make their cocoons, while others would 
keep eating many days yet. It is very easy to prevent that difficulty to 
maintain as well as to obtain a perfect uniformity. It requires only at- 
tention, and look to it from the very hatching. So one will be careful 
not to mix the worms of one day with those of another day, an easy 
thing to avoid by means of labels, and it will be all right as far as the 
first moulting. But at that period one might unmatch them by feeding 
before they are all quite awake, which means, before the transforma- 
tion be complete. To avoid this, one must know that particular mo- 
ment, and I am about to show it to you as best I can, bringing you to it 
by the number of meals and the different appearance of the insect ; for 
the worm that was just born, exactly one twelfth of an inch in length. 
English measure, can now be seen in all its parts distinctly, and with 
the look of the insect, as by means of other observations, there is no 
possible mistake for the beginner in breeding. 

The best way is to mark the meals, an easy thing by making a stroke 
with a pencil on the edge of each paper sheet every time you feed. One 
thing not less essential, is to spread the leaves very evenly, so that part 
of the worms, cannot eat more than the others. After eighteen meals, 
including the one given in taking up your worms, most of them will be 
buried beneath the leaves; the others, as many as can be seen, will 
have a short, thick-set body, large head, and be scantily scattered 
about. It will look as if half of them are dead. Feed then one, two, 
three more meals, always still with chopped leaves, but very sparingly 
in order to bring to readiness the tardy comers, if there be any, but 
when they commence emerging after moulting, and as soon as you see 
some fellows more slender, with elongated snout, very broad, much 
broader than the sleepers, wandering about and eating well, stop feed- 
ing and let them fast till all the worms have come out ; that will not be 
long. By and by, the worms will thicken, and in eighteen hours they 
will all come out, if the temperature be warm. For prudence's sake, 
it is well to wait twenty-four hours. 

If marking or counting the meals has been forgotten, one can tell 
that the worms are going to moult, when (after they have commenced 
by devouring the leaf), they gradually lose appetite. The body swells, 
tliey stick with their silk to the leaf (.which they do not eat any more,) 
in order to rid themselves of the skin, and stand motionless, the head 
slightly raised up, then the snout loosens itself, and the skin is let go. 
and given over as a useless sheath. It is very easy to tell a wide-awake 
worm amongst sleeping ones. It is more difficult to tell a worm just 
coming out of moulting, from the one that has scarcely commenced 
going into it. A watchful person will know a worm which has under- 
gone the transformation by its lengthened and comparatively more 
slender body, its lighter color, its snout too, changed in color and twice 
its former size. The snout is the only part of the worm that will grow 
no more till the next moulting. The sudden growth of that part, makes 
a marked difference, remarkable amongst all others between the two 
worms at all moultings. It is striking when the worm that has just 
moulted, and the one about to do it, are side by side. The period from 
hatching to the first age is very delicate and deserves the greatest 
watching. Like with babies, the light and watchful hand of the 
woman makes an easy job of it. They are fed six times a day, which 
makes three days duration for that age. 

Firxl Molt— Same minute care ; after eighteen to twenty-four hours 
fasting you give one first meal of young whole twigs. At the fourth 
or fifth meal when the worms are all on the leaves that you took care to 
feed somewhat more freely (.plentiful,) you clean the litter. To do it, 
you need again to pick one leaf after another, one at a time, and space 
them so as to double at least and sometimes treble the space allowed 
to the worms. If there remain still any, and there remain always 



of the Silk Worm. IS 



some, you spread a few leaves on the bed, to gather the last ones be- 
fore you throw away the litter. From that moment you. feed chopped 
leaves spread very evenly, as much between the worm covered leaves as 
on the worms themselves. They will spread to the interstices to reach 
fresh leaves, and get distance naturally, from the first meal ; you will 
continue in that way. feeding five or six times a day, till the second age. 
After eighteen meals make the same remarks much easier than 
the first time. Let the whole bulk of" them come out well before you 
content an appetite that has become devouring. 

Second Moll—The Silk worm, quite black when just born, a little less 
so when out of the first moulting, is now of a dark, almost ashy hue. 
Whole leaves are fed from the first meal, the litter is removed, and the 
worms are spread on an enlarged surface, and as soon as they appear 
to lose appetite, and commence putting on the big head, then leaves are 
chopped, fed sparingly, etc. During that period, four meals a day at 
least are needed, or five if it can be done. 

Third Molt— If your worms stand thick when just out of the second 
sleep, they must have three times as much room again, to be able to 
acquire without being too crowded, the size they will have on the fourth 
moulting. If you cannot give four meals a clay, you will give but three 
somewhat more copious, and during three days, they will devour the 
leaves. It is the time of the first little hurry which corresponds to the 
time of greatest hunger. The sleep is the time of moulting. By that 
time, the worm has become entirely white if he belongs to the breed of 
white worms ; those who are to furnish yellow silk, you will know by 
their feet, which are exactly of that color, those producing white silk 
have white feet. There are breeds that will remain black, or iron grey, 
some have rings black and white, tiger like, etc. The color whatso- 
ever it may be, give yellow, white or green cocoons. The litter is to be 
cleaned twice. 

Fourth Molt or fourth age.— The first transformation is easily effected ; 
this seems to be the most laborious, and it is the most dangerous ; when 
it is effected smoothly, success is almost certain. At every moulting, 
the very color of the worm is dimmer, and whitens gradually; at this 
moulting it is almost terreous. The worm is lean and feeble ; as soon 
as the greatest part of them is well out, it is necessary to give them a 
light meal with wild leaves, if there is any left yet, without waiting for 
the last ones. At the first meal, they will whiten some, a,t the second, 
third and fourth they are quite white, and grow visibly. Nov/ the hurry 
has come, throw them plenty of leaves at least three times a day ; when 
this is done, you hear immediately a noise of a heavy shower falling on 
the green foliage, it is the noise of their teeth chewing the leaf, which 
they gnaw close to the wood. If you have a great quantity of silk 
worms, you will have for eight days regular hard work, but it is only 
for eight days, after which comes the reward. That thought will im- 
part you renewed energy. Eight clays are soon gone. 

FIFTH AGE. 

Putting up the Heatlt. — Hix or eight days after the fourth sleep, if you 
see the worms losing their appetite, taking a dislike for the leaves, 
shrinking from it, growing smaller, becoming transparent as if contain- 
ing a clear liquid, gold colored for the yellow, for the other colors, the 
color of their silk ; and raising their heads, which they move to and fro ; 
if some commence spinning their cocoons among the leaves or climb 
up the shelves, it is time to give them the heath. 

HOW TO SET THE HEATH. 

_ To set the heath or give wood, means to prepare cells for the forma- 
tion of the cocoons. In many districts of South France heath is used 
for that, hence the term now technical : set up the heath. Branches 
of evergreen or common oak, olive tree, etc., are used too. As well as 
wheat straw or colewort straw. I have found here plenty of shrubs and 



16 Rearing and Breed! nr/ 

other plants among weeds which will do just as well as our heath. 
Their names will be given further. They may be gathered and pre- 
pared in winter, and kept tied in bunches ready for use. These branches 
must be cut four inches longer than the intervals between the trays or 
tables placed over each other, first to have them tight, and to form 
above each table a branchy ceiling close to the underside of the next 
table above, leaving as little space of its boards uncovered as possible, 
the worms being apt to fall from a bare board, and not be able to climb 
up again. To cfo that, the branches, or small bunches of weeds are set 
up perpendicularly, in straight rows across the tables from edge to 
edge, commencing with the uppermost table. Generally the ceiling is 
used to prop or rest the top of that first set of branches, otherwise, 
loaded boards have to be disposed at the recpiired distance above the 
upper table. The branches set up perpendicularly head upwards, stem 
downward, in perfectly straight rows, are bent in their upper part d- 
ternatively right and left, against the upper boards or table, so as to 
form ogive-like arches. These arches would heave up the upper- 
most tables, if nut fixed, and all the others successively. 

Have the stems close enough to each other, so that the wandering 
worms may find them easily ; the branches bushy, still not too thick 
for the worms to work easy among them. The rows about fourteen 
inches apart must be very straight to enable the operator to continue 
feeding and leaving the litter in these new compartments. That work 
is considerably shortened, or rather entirely suppressed, if the hurdle 
system used in the cocooneries at Silkville is 'adopted. These hurdles, in 
which the worms appear comfortable and easy to attend, are' very 
handy to be moved from place to place, and are made of a double row 
of cleats so disposed as to enclose the cocoons in their intervals. Lad- 
ders are made in the same model, and then ready the moment of setting 
the heath. Their use dispenses entirely with the work of the prepara- 
tion and putting up of the branches. 

One not used to the raising of silk worms can have no idea of the 
feeling imparted by the sight of these thousand insects, starting to mo- 
tion, climbing up the branches, looking for a favorable spot, then leav- 
ing a fine, thin thread at every attainable sprig, surrounding himself 
by decrees with a transparent gauze, which is not silk yet ; it is the floss. 
When the insect has achieved the preparation of the ground by means 
of all these ties, then commences a regular work. An elegant form is 
shaped, the silk worm is seen yet, but the tissue thickens rapidly, tak- 
ing in color, green, white, yellow or red, and the insect finally disap- 
pears. In twenty-four hours its cocoon is perfected. Imagination can 
scarcely conceive how an insect always seen so far destitute of quick- 
ness, can, in such a short time, work out a ball whose only thread is 
often 1300 yards in length, so easily wound off that the reel on which it 
is wound up. more than two yards in circumference, may be made to 
turn as fast as the wheels of a carriage driven at full speed, and if the 
spinner is attentive the thread will not break, 



of the Silk Worm. 



11 



HOW TO SET THE HEATH. 




Yet, spite, of all care and pains taken by the breeder to insure even- 
ness in the worms, they will not go up all the same time. It takes 
often four or five days for all those of the same party to make 
their cocoons. It is indispensable then to multiply the meals as 
much as possible, by giving a very small quantity of leaves each time, 
for every instant some of them give up the leaf for the wood or 
branches. Then, too, they rid themselves of all the matters contained 
in their body, and soil the food for the others which remain behind. 
Feed, then, little and often ; the best way to secure that result is to chop 
the leaves. A handful of cut leaves will spread itself on a whole case, 
and each worm takes the little he may want to get quite ready. With 
whole leaves one feeds always too much, and with great difficulty. Not 
having a regular leaf cutter, I found out a most speedy way to cut it 
rapidly. Here it is : Grind very sharp one of those scythes, like hay 
knives, used to cut hay from the stack ; gather the leaves in a heap, 
pressing them under your knees ; cut first the sides all around, so as to 
have the heap square, then you may go on cutting an inch or so in 
thickness, for it is useless to cut it too fine. In this way, a man can cut 
a hundred pounds of leaves or more in a quarter of an hour. A leaf 
cutter does no better. The advantages of cutting the leaf are to make 
double the quantity of work in spreading it on the worms; to save at 
least one-half of the leaf, and consequently time in [licking it; by spar- 
ing leaves avoid fermentation or the litter," of the trouble of cleaning at 
least one time ; and last, to prevent worms from being inpired by fer- 
menting leaves, and some of them to make their cocoon among the 
leaves, which occurs very often, when the leaf being whole and mixed 
with twigs, they find interstices handy to work them in. Such cocoons 
are lost or spoiled too often. The cut leaves do not present such dan- 
ger. In no case is a due degree of warmth needed more than now, 
3 



18 Rearing and Breeding 



while the insects are forming their cocoons ; this enables them to draw 
forth and to surrender promptly the whole amount of silk they have 
laid up in store. Ventilation, by all means ; with it you save leaves, 
time and silk. 

"When nearly all the worms have come out. and but few remain in 
the cell, they 'must be taken out one by one and put in separate cases 
prepared for that use. It is worse than useless to spend an hour's time 
in feeding a few leaves in a hundred cells to worms that could be held in 
one. Immediately after you remove the litter, and then work is done ; 
you have nothing left to do but to harvest. 

GATHERING THE COCOONS. 

Six days after the silk worms have come up, the collecting of the co- 
coons may be commenced. Still, if the weather had been cold, it 
would be safer to wait a day or two more, that all the worms would be 
transformed into chrysalis. Nevertheless, it is easy to ascertain it by 
shaking a few cocoons taken at random. If they emit a dim sound it 
is a pretty sure sign that the metamorphosis is completed. You may 
commence. 

The first thing is to take apart the bushy cabins where the worms 
first climbed up. With precaution the wood is taken off and carried to 
and laid down carefully, by the persons whose business it is to gather 
the cocoons, care being taken not to crush any. The women in charge 
of them have to examine them first to see if there are any spotted or 
stained ; if so, they must remove them at once, being careful not to soil 
the other ones. Then the 'clean ones are taken one by one neatly, the 
good one side, and the weak or soft ones on the other side. The sound 
ones are easy to tell by their firmness and solidity. The soft ones, if 
mixed with the others, would be crushed, and would stain them. One 
cannot be too careful m that respect, particularly when the cocoons 
have to be shipped. 

When the baskets are full, they are carefully weighed and spread on 
the same well cleaned trays or cases, where they spent their lives. 
They need be handled with precaution, and not be heaped too thick, 
still at six or seven inches in thickness there is no danger. 

That operation being done, the finest cocoons are picked out for seed 
next year. Select the strongest, most elegantly shaped, and those 
whose tissue or thread is finest. If white, take them of purest white, 
neither soft, nor satin like ; if yellow, give the preference to the straw- 
colored, which are the most sought after ; and last, if they are the green 
of Japan, the greener they are of a dark and sharp color, very glossy, 
the better is the quality of thread. Discard the pale shades in the last 
breed. 

Some breeders think that cocoons well rounded on both ends, broad 
in the middle, contain females, while the more slender, pointed on the 
ends, are males. I do not believe it correct, and think it is next to im- 
possible, to the smartest connoisseur, not to be mistaken. Besides, 
whether you pick them out at random, or select them carefully, there 
will be a number nearly equal of both sexes. 

Twelve or thirteen ounces of cocoons will produce one ounce of seed 
or eggs, unless the males be too many in proportion to the females, or 
the moths not all very robust (stout). Finally a hundred females can 
give 40,000 eggs, which, if they all come out well, would produce 130 
pounds of silk, and more for some breeds in which 200 cocoons makes a 
pound, it would then be 200 pounds. It is to be understood that these 
figures can only be approximative, still they often prove to be correct 
in small breeding, and I have myself bought and brought to seed in 
Asia Minor, whole lots of cocoons, out of which I obtained one pound 
of seed from twelve and one-half pounds cocoons. 

When you have selected the cocoons for SQecl, there remains nothing 
for you to do but to carry the rest of them to the reeling factory, or to 
the agent of the reeler. It is customary for extensive reelers to have 



of ilie Silk Worm. 19 



agents, in remote districts, who receive and ship forward the goods. 
There are such in all silk growing regions. If there is neither factory 
nor agent at hand, the cocoons are to be smothered and dried, after 
which they may be shipped to any distance, and sell on samples in all 
and every market of the world. To ship cocoons or to send gold is just 
the same ; you never meet with refusal. As for you, sericicultors of 
Louisiana (that is to be), you will enjoy the rare advantage of having 
spinning factories before you have cocoons to sell. Hurry up, then, to 
produce them. 

STIFLING- THE CHRYSALIS. 

If you cannot sell your cocoons as soon as you have gathered them, 
you must stifle the "chrysalises, so as to reel or set them at any time 
after. Our farmers in the Cevennes mountains use ovens to kill them. 
They Jput their cocoons in bug baskets, cover them with old cloths, 
making an oven full or two, after the bread is drawn, (a brick oven con- 
tains twelve long baskets, covering twelve square yards). After half 
an hour in the oven they remove the hot cocoons from the baskets on 
the floor all together, and cover them all with blankets to stifen them 
completely, and then, after a few hours, they dry them upon the shelves, 
where they are examined for the mite, a little insect which eats them. 
Every bored cocoon is good for nothing. 

The surest and best mode of stifling the chrysalis is to do it by steam. 
Every flour mill can do it easily, having for that purpose a kind of ward- 
robe containing eight or ten bases $>r shelves in rows, one above the 
other, and shutting hermetically. When the boxes are full of cocoons, 
steam is turned in during ten minutes ; the wardrobe being well shut 
up, let the steam do its deadly work for ten minutes more, then dry 
them in the sum. 4 

Here the cocoons need only to be fully exposed to the rays of the sun, 
from nine o'clock in the morning' till four o'clock in the afternoon. 
Two or three days of such exposure is sufficient. But, as some time, 
strong wind can anihilate the effect of the sun warmth, it is good to 
have for that purpose long boxes, four feet wide, sides six inches high, 
to be covered with glass frames. This will increase the heat, and by 
absorbing the air of the box, stifle your chrysalis most surely. 

BUTTERFLIES. 

Cocoons selected for seed are usually preserved in chaplet or chain. 
Great care must be exercised to take with the needle the least possible 
of the stuff, so as not to hurt the chrysalis nor to spoil the moth. 

These chains or chaplets are hung in a well ventilated passage or 
room, protected from mice. As early as the twelfth or fifteenth day 
the butterflies commence to show themselves. You can readily single 
out the males ; they are smaller, more slender, with incessant fluttering 
of the wings ; from the more quiet females, with their large belly full 
of eggs. They will pair themselves together naturally ; still they" hap- 
pen sometimes to be too far from each other to meet readily. You then 
bring them together, and as soon as they are joined, take both of them 
by the wings and set them on a piece of pasteboard or paper, disposed 
in a room or corner made as dark as possible, to prevent the males 
from uncoupling themselves. They begin to emerge out of the cocoon 
from four to eight o'clock in the morning. Supposing, as is generally 
the case, that by half -past eight they are all paired, six hours later, that 
is about two o'clock p. m.. you separate them. Meanwhile visit them 
two or three times, and if some have uncoupled themselves before com- 
plete impregnation, unite them agarm Should you have males to spare, 
put them in a closed box and preserve them for the next day, for it 
might happen that some other day females would outnumber the 
males. If, on the contrary, on the first day you have fewer males than 
females, instead of separating them at two o'clock in the afternoon, 
take as many males as you want, by uncoupling some pairs at ten or 
eleven o'clock. Take the best looking, they are always the strongest. 



20 Rearing and Breeding 



As you go to uncoupling, put the females on a cloth or paper hung oh 
the wall or on a rod, to insure cleanliness in the seed, for if you should 
spread them on a table they would soil each other and stain their eggs, 
too, with their droppings. Preserve the males in a box by themselves, 
avoiding to mix them with those not yet used, which are preferable ; 
but sometimes both are wanted, particularly the last day. As the 
females, whether paired or not, never fail to lay their eggs at two 
o'clock p. m., one needs always to have males to spare in store. As 
soon as she is uncoupled, she commences laying small eggs, yellow the 
first day, and which gradually acquire their natural color in three days. 

The moths live for about twelve days from the breaking out of the 
cocoons. If the seed has not been impregnated, it remains ever yellow 
and after a while dries up, while that which has acquired the lilac color 
stays round, slightly flattened, but always full till the next spring. It 
is left to dry where it was laid, for some days, when it is removed to a 
place cool and dry, as already explained in the forepart of this book. 

Never forget that rats are very fond of silk worm chrysalises, moths 
and eggs. They will cut through the cocoon to get the worm. In 
short, they feast on that insect and relish it, no matter in what dish or 
shape ; keep them off carefully. 

If stained, ill-shaped, feeble moths are found, feed them to the 
chickens. It is better to have less seed than to have some of inferior 
quality mixed with the good. Especially never procure seed from a 
region where silk worms are affected with certain particular diseases, 
and such districts are many, but apply to capable and, above all, to 
honest persons. 

I will now speak about silk worm diseases, though I think it may be 

Eerfectly useless, owing to the excellency of this climate. Still it would 
e possible for you to kill your silk worms by feeding them wet leaves, 
or gathered too early in*the morning with the dew on. Let them fast 
a whole day, rather than to impose them to such risk. Always have at 
least two meals gathered in advance, and near the close of the breeding 
one day's food for the next in extensive large breeding. In small 
breeding it is practicable to cut whole branches, and put them in-doors to 
dry, after shaking off the rainwater, or, to make the best of a propitious 
hour, to gather in a few moments the needed provision. If there is any 
dew, never pick your leaves before the sun has dried them. 

DISEASES OF THE SILK. WORMS. 

It is useless to go back in the history of the silk worms, previous to 
1869, if we will not be exposed to renew some old error about the dis- 
eases of the silk worms. The progress of the microscope has since 
clearly demonstrated that the characteristics of all the diseases of this 
precious insect are the rapid growth and multiplication, of myriads of 
inferior organized beings, in vital concurrence with the Bombyx, which 
kill it very often after a short resistance. Sometimes, all the larva" 
die before they have built their cocoons, after all expenses have been 
made, then it is a complete failure. These diseases are : 

First— The flatness, or flat died worms ; a most terrible sickness which 
kills the stoutest larva? almost instantly, just in the very moment when 
it is ready to spin. Its characteristics are a kind of cellular chain or 
chaplets discovered in the digestive tube of the larva? of the chrysalises 
and of the moths, by Mr. Pasteur, a celebrated French Academician. 
These cellular ferments have been scientifically named Bombycis mi- 
orosimas. This' disease, accidental and hereditary, but not contagious, 
can't be seen in the eggs. It can be avoided by the careful examina- 
tion of the moths, provided that each one of them has laid its eggs 
upon a small sheet of linen, where it has been pinned up, for ulterior 
examination. This way of isolating the moth is called Pasteur's or 
cellular system. 

Second— The pebrine, from the provincial word pebre, pepper ; so 
palled because the larva?, in the last period of the sickness have 



of tfie Silk Worm. 6 21 



their white skin covered with small, black, pepperlike spots. It is 
characterized by the vibrating Cornalia's corpuscles, so called from the 
learned Italian 'Cornalia, who first discovered them under his powerful 
magnifying glass. These oscillating or vibrating corpuscles, bright sil- 
ver colored, of an oval shape, are found in the eggs, in the bodies of the 
worms as well as in those of the chrysalises and of the moths. It is 
peculiarly sometimes, say three or four months after the moths have 
laid their eggs and died, 'that the job of examining is the easier, be- 
cause the corpuscles have grown and become adults in the dead bodies ; 
they multiply considerably too, and then it is very difficult to make any 
mistake in the selection of the pure or of the diseased cells ; neverthe- 
less, the operation must be made carefully, for this disease is heredi- 
tary and contagious to the last degree. 

Third— The Muscardine, characterized by a microscopic mushroom, 
discovered by Dr. Bassano, botritis bassania, which attacks peculiarly 
the breathing apparatus of the worms. This plague is accidental, not 
hereditary, but it is sporadical, and its rapid propagation is to be 
feared. The worm first dies suddenly, white and flat, then a few min- 
utes after it turns rigid and snow white or pink, seemingly covered up 
with mill flour, or pink dust ; such are the characteristics of this re- 
doubtable plague ; I never heard of in the United States, but common 
enough in northern quite rainy latitudes. 

All these diseases and a few others of a less dangerous character are 
the result of domestication, of a wrong way of breeding, of the ier- 
mentation of the litters, and of the infection of the air. The asphixia, 
or suffocation of the larvae, is brought about too often by shutting the 
doors and windows after lighting fires, in order to get a certain degree 
of temperature. i 

The diseases of all kinds are surely created by a bad hygienic condi- 
tion, bad kind of food, such as many varieties of mulberry trees, 
fermented leaves of the best kinds, in so many words, all of which 
produce in mankind rheumatism, purulent infection, typhus, and 
yellow fever. 

Let us see, now, what is to be done to fight or prevent these disas- 
trous epizootics and what means have been employed to this day. For 
the muscardine, we have only aeration and cleanliness. Disinfect the 
room, if you have been forgetful of this important rule ; that is all. A s 
for the pebrine and flatness, all means have been employed. The dis- 
eased breeds have been crossed with sound or wild breeds — Chinese, 
Japanese, etc. — by importing at a great cost, every year, eggs from silk 
countries thought free from disease. Later, Cornalia examined the 
eggs, and declared them worthless, when they were found to have more 
than four per centum of corpuscles. Pasteur mashes the dead bodies 
of the butterflies, submits that dirt under his microscope, and keeps 
only the eggs of the ones pure of vibrating corpuscles and of cellular 
chaplets and chains. 

These cases have given the most brilliant results. Cornalia found the 
means to discern and surely state the disease. Pasteur, helped by his 
discoveries, has found the means to procure good, sound seed. Both 
have equal rights to the eternal gratitude of all the silk-growers ; both 
have immortalized their names, though neither of them found the 
means to regenerate the silk- worm breed definitively, completely and 
absolutely. And to reach this end it is only necessary to restore them 
to their natural primitive state, or, at the least, breed them after nature 
as near as possible. 

I will not mention here the experiments made atBoissere's by myself 
and by Mr. Clair, though we have seen our fine French — but quite peb- 
rined — breeds completely restored to health upon the mulberry tree. 
There they have enjoyed the dew, the rain, the sun, and once a light 
snow ; and not only none of them were sick, but they have engendered 
a stout breed, which did very well in France and in Italy last spring, 
while European and Japanese breeds were dying at the rate of seventy 



££ Rearing and Breeding 

to ninety per hundred. The fait of Dr. Baley, from Jackson, Miss., 
who succeeded so well with the same breeds regenerated at Silkville, 
and bred by himself in his gallery, in full open air, is not to be men- 
tioned either as a conclusive experiment; but both these cases, with 
many others, may be quoted in order to enforce the experiments of 
eminent observators and sericicole authorities, who, long before us all, 
solved this important problem. 

In 1859, at Milan, Italy, Mareschal Vaillant attempted, with great 
success, a small breeding in full open air. The same was repeated on a 
larger scale by learned Taverna, of the same city, in 1860, with same 
encouragement. The eminent sericulturists and learned men, Martins, 
from Montpelier, Prollin, Andre, from Anduze, and many other natu- 
ralists in France, have deposited the young worms, or even the eggs, 
upon lots of mulberry trees previously covered with nets, in order to 
protect the larva? against the birds, etc., and succeeded, with sound and 
diseased breeds, to perfection. But, in spite of their universal success, 
these means are impracticable— the ants, rats, mice, spiders, etc. , or the 
hail, being a constant and unavoidable danger to the crop. 

But if the breeding upon the tree is not feasible, Mr. Gintson, from 
Bordeaux, has proven by breeding lots of not less than 240,000 to 400,- 
000 silk worms in full open air, that this way is the best, as it is the 
cheapest and the surest. 

In 1869 he began with 240,000, or four ounces of eggs, belonging to 
three different provinces, one of which was quite infested with pebrine 
and flatness. The young worms were kept the first ten days at Bor- 
deaux in a room whose doors and windows were constantly kept open ; 
then for eight days in a greenhouse largely ventilated. ' In spite of 
these good conditions, the disease beginning to appear, and many 
worms dying every day, they were brought upon two rows of shelves, 
supported by posts fixed in the middle of a large meadow — the shelves 
made out of willow canes or lattices, between which the air circulated 
easily, drying the litter so rapidly that cleaning was judged an unnec- 
essary operation . A shelter of rough boards protecetd the worms against 
the hail, but not against the rain. The side walls were made of rough 
linen or nets, just good enough to keep the birds away ; the posts sur- 
rounded with a piece of tin to prevent rats and mice from climbing up 
the shelves. The temperature went as low as sixty Farenheit twenty- 
four times, and as low as fifty Farenheit four times. 

In these conditions not another worm died— 400 pounds of cocoons 
out of four ounces of eggs. Such was the result. The experiment has 
seen its fourth repetition on a larger scale with the same success. 
Whether the eggs were diseased or sound, there was no difference in 
the splendid product. 

In China, in many provinces of Japan, in Syria, in Asia Minor and 
other Eastern countries, I have visited for six years for the purpose of 
selecting the best breeds and the soundest for the Sericultural Society, 
of Lai'gentiere, my native country. I have seen the worms bred in the 
galleries or in full open air, protected only by rough nets or carpets 
hanging round the shelves for the time, and returned to their destina- 
tion "after the silk season was over. 

It is true to say that in northern regions the breeding in such condi- 
tions would be very long and tiresome, but in southern latitudes noth- 
ing cheaper nor easier, as the cane sheds, the gins and house galleries 
Avill be there the best spots to raise the silk worms, after the second 
transformation or molt has been performed in a smaller room. 

I hope this demonstration will show the northern breeder, obliged to 
light Are in the cocoonery, the necessity of combining heat with ven- 
tilation, and the southern Avill understand that the rules made for Kan- 
sas or Iowa, Valakia or France, are useless and hurtful for Louisiana 
and Alabama, or Syria and Portugal breeders. 

Since the only mean's to restore to health the diseased worms is to 
raise them in nature's fashion, approach, imitate nature, save trouble, 
save money, and go on in security. 



of Silk the Worm. 23 

COCOONERY OR MAG-NANERY. 

Whether the breeding is small or large, it is necessary to be able to 
give heat or ventilation at will. "With small breedings these conditions 
can be easily obtained, for often the silk worms there raised will fail 
much to fill up the premises, whether room, kitchen or stable, which 
they are to be accommodated with. Then the bulk of air beiug pro- 
portionally very considerable for the small quantity of worms, the air 
could not be vitiated ; still, if the apartment is hermetically close, it 
should be renewed once in a while. To do it one needs to have each 
window fitted outside with a frame covered with light cloth. At about 
9 o'clock in the morning, when the warmth makes itself felt, open the 
windows; the air infiltrates slowly but continually through the cloth, 
and cools the apartment without blowing too directly upon the worms, 
while a sudden change of the temperature might prove hurtful to them. 
When it is getting dark let down the window sashes again, and start a 
fire in the stove before going to bed and after feeding the last meal. 
Never start a fire without at the same time feeding leaves, too. If you 
have no thermometer, remember that where you feel comfortable, 
clothed in light breeches and shirt sleeves, the worms, too, feel com- 
fortable. 

When a larger quantity of worms is to be raised, the construction 
of a special building becomes a necessity, and as it will be used for 
that particular purpose only for a month, every one will be at liberty to 
use it the balance of the year for something else, such as stable, hay 
loft, store-room, etc., which lessens the expenses to be charged on that 
crop. Still, while disposing your cocoouery, with an eye to the corn, 
wheat, cows or horses, you must keep in view its first destination. 
Therefore, if you can afford it, you will have a cellar underneath, to 
keep your leaves fresh. In the floor, between the cellar and the co- 
coonery, valves should be disposed at distances along the passages, so 
as to be opened or shut up at will, to admit cool air in sultry, warm 
weather. 

I have not seen such case here yet, and I do not know if it can hap- 
pen in this country, where the wind blows constantly. I only foresee 
the occurrence for such as might meet with it, whether here or else- 
where. By the way, it is not expensive. ]f the ceiling is made of 
nailed and grooved boards, let there also be an equal number of valves, 
corresponding to those in the floor below. Loose boards for the ceiling- 
would do better, or at least have one loose board above each passage 
that could be opened or shut at will. There will be one or two chim- 
neys for one or more stoves, according to the size of the building or 
room. Have the windows on the east and west sides, and the door on 
the south, all fitted with sashes of light cloth, a means of ventilation 
which I believe to be quite sufficient for our climate. I have not used 
any other here, and succeeded well. Still, it must be borne in mind that 
I do not speak for Louisiana only, and the years may not be all alike. 
Beware, then, of neglecting such easy means. Build up your cocoonery 
with bricks, stone or boards, with one or two stories, as you please, or 
as you can ; if the ventilation is good, all will go Avell. 

DISPOSITION OF THE TABLES IN THE COCOONERY. 

The tables or trays, which are to receive the silk worms, are made in 
various ways ; sometimes with wide, rough boards, but fitting well to- 
gether, leavinsr no cracks through which worms might fall; sometimes 
they have hurdles made of willows or cleats, covered with paper. 
These tables are supported by four posts, connected by cross pieces, on 
which the table rests. Their maximum width must not exceed six 
feet, so that a person can reach with the hand to the middle of the 
table in feeding or removing the litter. There needs then be a passage 
left between each row of tables; if there are two row r s the passage in 
the middle must be a little wider than the other two. Three feet are 
enough, and even less would do when circumstances require it. Verti- 



84 Rearing and Breeding 



cally the space between one table and the next above must be one foot, 
or a little more, if you have room to spare, so that in the last days a 
room seven feet high can contain six tables placed over each other. If 
there are too many worms, part of them may be put on the lower 
floor and part on the upper, which will make eight tables for seven 
feet height of the room. If each table is six feet wide by nine feet long, 
that is,Jftfty-four square feet, you have with eight tables 432 square feet, 
which may hold from 180 to 200 pounds of cocoons, or about 50,000 silk 
worms, who will eat 3600 or 4000 pounds of leaves. 

PrOm the number of mulberry trees, two, three, four. or ten years old, 
one can see at once how many times he can have 4000 pounds of leaves, 
and therefrom how many rows of eight tables, or much belter often 
tables, he will need in his cocoonery. 

Ladders are generally used to tend to the upper tables ; stands or 
shelves are handier, by far. At man's height crosspieces, sufficiently 
strong, are set across the passages, resting on the vertical posts on both 
sides for the middle passages, and on the posts and wall for the side 
passages. Then a strong, thick board is laid on the crosspieces along 
the tables, 'to stand upon. In this way the work is more rapidly and 
easily done -of course this is only in rooms higher than seven feet. 

VARIOUS DETAILS OF ATTENDANCE. 

Removing the litter is done in this way : Whole leaves are thrown to 
the worms; then both leaves and worms 'are taken by handfuls and set 
aside, while an empty spot is made and swept clean immediately so 
that the worms do not remain piled up too long, and so forth, for which 
operation small, short brooms are used, made of weeds, briars, or no 
matter what. In the Ardeche they make use of tame or wild thyme, 
which perfumes the floors and embalms the apartment. Our farmers 
fancy that the worms like the perfume, btit it would be difficult to prove 
that they are right, for if the worms are more quick, active and in bet- 
ter appetite, it may be due perhaps to their liking for cleanliness, with- 
out caring for the perfume. They succeeded with or without it. 

In large breedings nets are used, which are spread on the worms, 
taking care in lifting them up to pull evenly by the four corners, in or- 
der that the middle does not hollow T itself into a bag. As soon as two 
or three meals have been fed, the first net is lifted up and removed with 
the worms on ; the litter is cleaned. This makes room for another net, 
and the job is soon done in this way, for it is the most expeditious way 
to do that work ; for the first ages, once at each moulting, and for the 
last ones, at least twice. Some make use of perforated paper instead 
of nets. It is well understood that two sets of nets are needed, for the 
first spread remains where it is till the second operation takes place, 
and is then removed with the litter to make room for a new net with 
worms and leaves, and so forth. Whatsoever way is used to clean the 
litter at the last ages, let doors and windows be wide open, except in 
case of particularly cold weather, and that day, as always, remove 
all dirt as you proceed cleaning the trays, and then sweep clean. 

To pick the leaf and to distribute it in the easiest way, bags must be 
fixed to the waist by strings or leather straps, having the bag just long 
enough so as not to drag on the ground and interfere with the worker's 
movements. Women use smaller ones, easily filled up and emptied. 
Any other utensil is heavy and cumbersome. 

If the worms are fed very often, say five or six times a day, each meal 
needs to be very light, spreading one leaf in thickness on the woims; 
but if, on the other hand, they are fed but three times a day, more leaf 
is thrown at a time. But in all cases it must be spread with the utmost 
regularity, lest the worms should eat more in one place than in the 
other, otherwise it would be altogether impossible to keep them even. 
As I said before, the worm that eats six meals in one day is as much 
forward as the one that takes three days to eat the same number of 
meals. Therefore, if in the distribution of the leaf some places get. 



of the Silk Worm. 25 

double the quantity that others have, the worms of the first will have 
two meals, while their neighbors get but one. They will undergo their 
moulting while the others keep eating, and at the cleaning you are 
pretty sure to throw away either the first or the last ones. Yet, if such 
a thing should happen, there is a simple way to remedy it. Here it is : 

When you see many of your worms asleep— that is, which stop eat- 
ing and allow themselves to be covered with leaves, while others con- 
tinue eating greedily, throw them large leaves, and as soon as those 
who eat have crept out, take them up with the leaves and remove them 
to another place ; then wait till the others are done moulting before you 
feed again. In this way out of one party you make two, one of which 
is ahead of the other, but in each of which all the worms are respec- 
tively even. Such operation is rapidly done with nets. 

It is necessary to have a cellar or any other cool place to keep a pro- 
vision of leaves, particularly in rainy climates where one often has. to 
pick leaves for a day or two in advance. In our Southern climate I be- 
lieve that two meals picked beforehand will be enough, so that one 
needs' not gather them too earlv in the morning with the dew on, or in 
case of a sudden storm which might overtake you when you are without 
leaves picked up, and compelled to let your poor worms' fast. 

The good keeping of the leaf is most essential, and it is very easy too. 
In putting it in the cellar, or elsewhere, care must be taken to shake and 
stir it thoroughly; so as to admit air, notwithstanding the thickness of 
the heap. When it has settled some, it must be stirred again, if it com- 
mences heating, but above all that, such leaf must never be fed before 
it has been shaken, once or twice, and before you are satisfied that none 
of it has been spoiled by fermentation, or is fermenting yet. Do not 
forget that, for such an oversight you might have to pay dearly by kill- 
ing a good many silk worms, when the expense is already made, or nearly 
so, for the leaf is put in large heaps only near the end of the breeding, 
when plenty of it is wanted every day. Rain or pure water on the leaf 
never injures the silk worm, but the dew or dampness resulting from 
the fermentation will kill them surely. In its natural state the silk 
worm— bombyx mori -remains benumbed during the night and the 
whole morning, till the heat of the sun or air quickens it from its tor- 
por ; it then never eats any dew. The hurt resulting from wet leaf by 
rain does consist sometimes in suddenly cooling an animal used to a 
warm atmosphere, which brings death. ' It does, too, always maintain 
too much dampness in the trays and in the room, and causes the fer- 
mentation of the litter. If, out of necessity, you are obliged to feed wet 
leaves, set up a bright fire— blazing fires are' best -to dry up and renew 
the air. 

EXTERNAL AND INTERNAL ORGANIZATION OF 
THE SILK WORM. 

We have already seen through what series of transformations or 
changes of skin the silk worm, like any other caterpillar, encloses itself 
in the most admirable tissue, and becomes a chrysalis and then a but- 
terfly. 

Let us examine with a magnifying glass the insect's head, its mand- 
ibles, its thread-spinning apparatus, legs, skin, and all its organs inter- 
nal and external. A marked swelling, covered with wrinkles, at the 
fore part of the body looks like the worm's head, but has only the 
appearance of it, and contains a greasy liquid. The hard part, which 
forms the snout, is the true head ; it is composed of indented mandibles, 
set side by side, hard, strong, movable, very fit to take hold of the leaf 
every way, making the first cut on the sides as well as in the middle, 
from their very birth ; the other part of the head is the (filiere) threader, 
a kind of membraneous apparatus, set with muscles, which presses as 
they pass, and strongly joins together by means of a gummy substance, 
two silk threads so adherent that they can be severed only by means of 
powerful chemical agents. These two silk threads are slipped out of 
4 



®6 Hearing and Bn^dku/ 

two inner reservoirs, full of a transparent liquid, which hardens in the 
air and becomes thread by a phase of nature, easier recorded than ex- 
plained. Two black points adorn the head of the silk worm ; some 
people think they are eyes, and some say they are not. The feet are 
articulate, membraneous and fitted with hooks, whose principal nse is 
to fix the insect in any position. There are six of them in front, articu- 
late, used for motion, and eight at the back, membraneous, whose 
principal use is to fix the insect in any position ; they are called false 
feet, and are lengthened, taken in, and expanded, accordine; to the 
insect's wants. Twelve rings, alternately widening or nearing each 
cither, are used for locomotion; last of it, upon the "extreme back is a 
protuberance, a kind of tail, the use of which T ignore. At each side 
of the body there are nine black points. They are apertures which 
supply constantly to the larva the amount of air which it needs so much. 
Inside nearly five thousand muscles have been counted, used for loco- 
motion. The intestinal tube extends in straight line along the whole 
length of the body; it presents many inside divisions, and is externallv 
surrounded with many small channels, used for digestion. On each 
side of that tube are the two long reservoirs which contain the silky 
liquid ; they extend to the head where they unite with the threader or 
flliere, thus forming two threads that join on the outlet, as we have be- 
fore said. It was an error, very generally received, that the silk thread 
was already formed inside of the worm, but it is now proved that it is 
nothing but a liquid, which hardens as soon as it conies in contact with 
the outer air. 

At each moulting the silk worm changes the whole of its outer en- 
velope ; snout, skin, feet. When at its greatest development, about 
twelve or fifteen meals before the going up, the yellow silk worm is 
three inches in length. When just hatched, it is hot one-twelfth of an 
inch ; yet God, who pleases to snow the perfection of his work, as well 
in infinitely minute beings as in colossal ones, supplied it already 
with every thing. This animalcule is provided with a breathing 
apparatus, its five thousand muscles of locomotion, and its threader. 
It spins when being born, even before its first meal. Take the paper 
or cloth on which it has been hatched and you will see it hanging by 
the silk, an almost invisible thread, which in state of nature protects it 
against falling from the foster tree, and by the help of which thread the 
wind shoves it softly to the nearest limb or leaf from the rough bark on 
which its egg was affixed. 

A WORD ON SPINNING- AND MILLING. 
Spinning is the art of extracting silk out of the cocoon. It is not very 
long since when, in France, every cultivator used to spin his. own crop. 
In many parts of the Cevennes they do it yet. In the corner of the 
vard. under a temporary shelter built up out of rough boards used in 
the cocoonery, they set up a small stove fitted with a grate, and a 
copper or cast ironround wide basin. The whole is just high enough 
to be in the reach of the spinning woman sitting on a common chair ; 
an axle is fitted with a reel of about two yards in circumference, of six 
or eight bars parallel, and fixed on suitable arms, in the same position 
as the reel of a harvester used to bend the standing grain against the 
sickle. Such a reel is mounted on a stout, square, long bench, with 
four legs, and motion is imparted to it by means of a crank, pitman 
and footboard (the pitman being simply a rope). A boy or girl dance 
on that for a whole day at a time. The cocoons being in the basin 
with hot water, the silk that comes out of them passes "through four 
glass needles. The two first, placed close above the copper pan, are 
set on a small table, on one end of the bench, which receives all the 
trash, such as bare worms issued from completely-reeled cocoons, bad 
cocoons, etc. These glass needles are set about five or six inches apart ; 
the two others are set "on a wooden strip in the middle of the bench be- 
tween the first needles and the reel, which, by a combination of cogs and 
wheels, imparts from them a. back-and-forth motion, whose extent deter- 



oftkeSilk Worm. & 

mines the width of the skein, which winds itself around the reel. The reel 
itself is covered with a white cloth, intended to keep the silk from com- 
ing in contact with the wood. The spinning woman, when her first 
water is sufficiently warm, and stained with smashed chrysalises pro- 
ceeding from already wound-up cocoons (worms' water), takes about a 
half pound of cocoons in the basin and beats them softly with a broom 
made of fine briars ; after a moment she draws and shakes off all the 
downy stuff (bnnrrette), which by that process appears to be loosened 
from "the cocoons, then the cocoons also upon a long, smooth board 
which she keeps before her. That being done, a few cocoons are thrown 
in the pan, and let the thread be -seen which joins them to the heap laid 
on the boxes. The spinner takes four of these threads, passes them 
through a needle, then four more which she passes through the other 
needle, after which, gathering the two quadruple threads between the 
thumb and forefinger, she twists them together, in order to make what 
is called the crossing. The longer the crossing is— say, twenty to thirty 
turns, one thread on the other— the more each four cocoons' thread is 
even and strong. That crossing done, the reel-turner takes the two 
thread ends, passes them through the moving needles, the threads 
forming an X from the two first threads to the other two, and then, last, 
fastens them to one arm of the reel, which she then starts in motion 
with all the elasticity of her strength. I have seen women spinners to 
wind in that way one pound and a half in a day, when the cocoons were 
good. At night the silk is taken off, folded, and little by little is piled 
aw'ay in the the walnut chest, where it waits for the right time to be 
sold! In the good breeds, with a careful and experienced woman spin- 
ner, ten pounds of cocoons give one pound of silk. Put the cocoons at 
sixty cents a pound ; that will bring the cost of one pound of silk to $6 
or $7 ; it may be sold for $8, $9, or $9 50. It is well understood that I 
speak of the prices in France for five or six years. The girl of the 
house, assisted by her little brother, have learned the difference ; and, 
besides, there is the refuse silk, which pays three-fotirths. and some- 
times the whole of the spinning expenses, when strangers have to be 
hired. 

The home industry tends every day to disappear. First, because the 
silk spun in that way, cannot stand the competition with those pro- 
duced in the large spinning mills, which cost less and yet are better, 
and of course of easier sale. Indeed, a farmer needs a woman spinner, a 
reel turner, then a stove for each basin ; while 200 or 300 reels or more 
are moved by one engine, the same that supplies the two or three hun- 
dred basins with hot water put instantly to the right degree of heat by 
means of two cocks with which each spinner is provided, one for cold 
and one for hot water. Add to that enormous economy, the perfection 
of the work due to the classification and selection of the cocoons, and 
sometimes to the rapidity too, with which it is impossible to get rid of all 
poor and stained cocoons. These kinds want to be spun when fresh ; 
dry, they yield very little, with much difficulty and very bad ; fresh 
they are worth the others, if well spun. The owner of 200 basins can 
do it, the farmer cannot. Last of it, there is more profit for the farmer, 
and it is easier for him to sell his cocoons as soon as they are ready ; 
instead of waiting four to six months to sell his silk, sometimes at 
retail week after week, he will sell his goods and be paid for them all 
at the same time, which is pleasing enough. If he happens to be of 
small means, if his children have to earn their living, they will find in 
these very factories a steady and well paid occupation. 

The spinning stands foremost in order, and importance among all the 
silk industries. With the improvements brought to it, and which are 
being made to it constantly, the most admirable works are executed . 
almost all to order ; they ship three, four, twelve or twenty- five cocoons, 
according to the order received, whether it be at three or four for the 
finest fabrics, or at twenty- five or thirtv for the most beautiful musical 
instrument strings, and the strongest known. 



28 Rearing and Breeding 

The annual breeds, green and a few white Japan, the yellow and 
white of France, Italy, Syria and Adrianople, are spun at 3-J-. They 
call a half cocoon that which is nearly finished, almost clone winding-. 
The last end of the thread is much thinner than the first one and the 
middle. Among these breeds, it is not unusual to make one pound of 
silk out of nine or ten pounds of cocoons, but from eleven to twelve 
pounds is generally considered to be a fair average. The double 
cocoons forming a catalogue by themselves, which sells for only one 
quarter the price of the single ones, are in these breeds in the propor- 
tion of from two to ten per cent. Their value, and that of the silk made 
out of them, keeps them almost constantly at a good price, even in 
time of commercial crisis. People going into silk culture, will do well 
to content themselves Avith the raising of the most improved breeds. 

The breeds of second quality, yellow of Caucasus, yellow and white 
of the Balkans annual breeds, green and white of Japan Bivoltines and 
annual too, use often from sixteen to twenty-four pounds cocoons for 
one pound of silk. The thread of these is generally downy, and has 
but little sinew in it. The prices of these are invariably inferior, and 
they can be sold only at a loss, in time of commercial crisis. Bivol- 
tines of Japan average from twenty-five to thirty per cent double 
cocoons, to add to these other defects. 

The white Trivoltines yield a pretty fine silk, at twelve cocoons for 
one thread, they are very hardy too, and succeed admirably; they go 
through their five ages in twenty-two days, but they include from sixty 
to ninetj' per cent not double, but treble, quadruple and sextuple 
cocoons ; like some breeds of Portugal, beautiful yellow cocoons, very 
fine, who have likewise the defect to join sometimes eight or nine in 
number to make one cocoon, which of course sells for ten cents a 
pound. If I speak to you about them at all, it is just to tell you that 
they do exist, and to advise you to keep away from them, avoiding to 
apply to unknown parties to supply you with seed. For it is sadly true, 
that among silk worm dealers there are many unprincipled men, who 
will sell under good breeds these worthless, ruinous kinds consuming 
much, to yield nothing. 

Happily, too, respectable firms are not Avanting ; one need only to 
procure reliable information. And then too, let us hope that in a short 
time we are to become the supplying market of the silk world. 

From the spinning mills, silk goes to the milling factories, so called. 
Spinning and milling form together the richest, the most vital, most 
productive of all known industries. Spinning makes the silk, milling 
gives to it consistency and fits it for all subsequent operations, whether 
ft be intended to become dress silk, velvet, ribbon or sewing thread, etc. 

Coming from the spinning mill in the shape of skeins, silk is wettened 
with purified olive oil and superfine soap, to remove the gum, to supple 
it, and to make the A\ 7 inding easier and less costly. Winding implies the 
tieing of every broken thread the removing of all down or other ob- 
struction which stops between the piece of cloth, silk or leather through 
which the silk-threads are made to pass before winding themselves 
around a spool and in a ball. The spools or balls are again wound off, 
in order to undergo a cleansing operation, through very tight sheets of 
cloth, between two Y-shaped iron pieces, which do not let anything 
pass, the least knot, the smallest particle is there stopped. Thence to 
the milling, where they undergo a first preparation after the doubling, 
and last to the second milling, called twister, where they are submitted 
to the torsion and last preparation. There the skeins are tied and kept 
ready to go to the dyeing and weaving. 

There is now nothing left to do but the folding and packing ; two del- 
icate operations entrusted only to special and well paid men. In fac- 
tories overseers generally have these last cares in charge, of which the 
most delicate and difficult is the matching of the various shades. 

According to the quality and breed of the cocoons, from which they 
proceed, silks want more or less working, and average a greater or less 



of the Silk WbrrU. 



percentage of waste. There are China and Bengal silks which require 
four hands to manage each row of twenty spinning wheels, and they do 
not enjoy a minute's rest, besides making an enormous waste, while 
they will manage a hundred wheels each, and take it easy, if they work 
silk from Broussa, Fossombrone, or other first rate silk, spun in first 
class factories. As a matter of course, too, the waste in these last silks 
is scarcely worth mentioning, for its only source is in the thread wasted 
in tieing, when it breaks, and in the downy obstructions which need to 
be removed. 

The whole of it then lays in this principle : To cultivate none but the 
finest breeds of cocoons, in order to reap the fairest, the most remuner- 
ative products, with the least possible expense, and to secure an always 
sure sale. 

RECAPITULATION. 

I receive so many letters, so many questions about silk culture, that 
it is not possible for me to answer them singly. This last chapter will 
answer better for all. 

Many ask if their climate or country is good for silk worms. It has 
been said wherever the mulberry tree finds a congenial climate and 
soil, the breeding of silk worms will succeed. 

The silk worms require a pure atmosphere. It has been observed 
that when raised in poor peasants' huts, enjoying the pure air through 
the cracks and broken windows, they succeed better than a large lot 
nursed in a spacious and costly building. Then it is better to have four 
cocooneries, of eight hundred pounds capacity each, than only one con- 
taining thirty-two hundred in a single large room ; that plan is now 
followed by every rich intelligent farmer in silk growing countries of 
Europe. 

Some claim noise, storm, thunder, to be prejudicial to silk worms. 
It is an old error ; for the poor farmers in France have lost many and 
many nice crops, by shutting their windows and their doors hermeti- 
cally when the storm was threatening. But that precaution and the 
heavy atmosphere, without a single breath of air which always pre- 
cedes thunder and lightning, they would choke or stifle an ox as well as 
worms. In such a case, let the air penetrate in the cocoonery through 
the sash of every door and window, and every means of ventilation you 
have. Burn some straw, or dried bushes through the passages, to 
purify and renew air abundantly, instead of shutting doors and win- 
dows, and let lightning, thunder^ storm, shocks of electricity of every 
kind do their best, your worms will be the same after as before. 

Another argues that work is dearer here than in France, and silk will 
cost too much. My mother shall give you an answer. The following 
is an extract from her letter: "We have had plenty of cocoons, grapes, 
figs, chestnuts, apples, plums, peaches, etc., all of the best quality, "but 
workmen are dear and the price of labor increases every day. A girl 
is paid 100 francs per month, and men fifty cents per day in silk time." 
They feast, you know, all the time with wine and every thing. "You 
are happy," she adds, "to raise your silk worms without fire; here we 
must pay very dear for coal or wood, and a special woman or man to 
regulate the fire from the beginning till the end. " That only constitutes 
half the expense of the breeding. Then the difference in'the price of 
labor here and in France, does not exist any more. We can raise silk 
cheaper with less than half the trouble. If the farmers consider that 
there is no culture more remunerative, and with that culture they will 
grow rich and enrich the country too, they will enter into the business 
directly. 

Silk worm breeding is so simple, that after the the first experience 
made the first year with the few leaves you will pick in pruning your 
young trees, this small book in hand, the wife or the eldest daughter 
shall superintend the work of feeding, clearing, etc., and tell to the 
younger ones what they have to do. 

Farmers blessed with a large family, let your children have a lot of 



> ! >0 Itearing and Breeding 

mulberry trees, in that way they will cost you nothing; they will be 
able to give you a nice profit, be independent md able to support them- 
selves from the product of one acre, going to school ten months— two 
months being sufficient to plow or cultivate mulberry trees, to feed silk 
worms and clean the cocoons. 

The feeding and taking care of the worms and cocoons, the reeling of 
silk, all this work in silk countries is done by ladies. This will also be 
the case in America, and a great improvement and benefit for them. 
They will certainly be proud to wear fine dresses made by their own 
hands. It is as natural to the woman to dress in silk cloth, to which 
she gives a new glare, as to the butterfly to shine among flowers, as to 
the flower itself to bloom in the sun ray. 

I have read somewhere that only one of our States sends about seven 
millions of dollars annually, to import silk for our ladies, our dear 
ladies. How immense, then, must be the amount sent by all the (States. 

Farmers of America, it depends on you that every girl might wear a 
silk dress, for in a, short time you can raise silk for your consumption 
and also for exportation. 

I have said enough in this little book to enable you to carry on a 
profitable business all over our country, but experience will teach you 
and me from year to year. I will be grateful to any one who shall suc- 
ceed in his first trial, to tell me how, under what circumstances and by 
what means he succeeded, taking peculiar notice of the origin of the 
seed. If you fail, I would also thank you to send me the cause of your 
failure, that in the future we can enlarge this little book, and cover all 
the points of instruction Avhioh future experience will give us. 

Remember that I am at your service, always ready to explain to you 
what I have omitted or what you do not understand "in this small trea- 
tise. Now my last Avord is : go into this business immediately, both for 
yourself and for the country; the sooner the better. 



COMPLEMENT TO SILK CULTURE IN AMERICA. 

WHAT SERICULTURE PROMISES TO MILLIONS OF IDLE HANDS. 

We have at this moment to maintain a polemic against the enemies 
of silk culture (sericulture) in America. Those enemies are— who 
would believe it ?— mill owners and manufacturers forming the Silk 
Association of America. Let us hear their reasons and meet them 
squarely. I do not intend to reopen the errors published in 1876 in a 
book entitled, "A History Prepared for the Centennial Exhibition ;" 
facts have refuted them a hundred fold, and it is well settled that the 
silk worm, reared under good conditions, thrives marvelously in sev- 
eral States of the Union. Their suggestions about persons who expect 
to raise silk worms, tending to discourage beginners and to hinder the 
general trial of this culture, are already swept away by the success of 
more than a hundred fruitful attempts before and since 1876. Their 
most serious allegation is the high price of the labor, which renders 
spinning impossible. Take their own words as found in the report of 
1876, page 48 : 

"In China or Japan the skilled labor of the artisan, inherited 
through more than thirty centuries of the same kind of toil, is amply 
repaid by from five to ten cents per day. A good reeler there will reel 
two pounds per week, and is satisfied with eight to ten cents a day. 
Hero even the poorest Chinese reeler would demand from seventy-five 
cents to a dollar a day. None of our Yankee girls would be willing to 
undertake it, though perfectly ignorant of the process, for less than SI 
a day. * * * Our friends who are determined to raise silk 
worms can do it in one way, and only in. one. There is a good market, 
and is likely to be for years to come, if it is not glutted, for silk worm 
eggs in France and Italy. * * * The needs of that 



of the Silk Worm. 31 

•market will furnish employment for a reasonable number of silk 
growers, while the pierced cocoons will find a ready sale, though at a 
Tower price, to our manufacturers who are producing spun silk.' - 

In speaking thus, these gentlemen are completely in error. They are 
ignorant, or affect to be ignorant, that distress is engendered in a coun- 
try for want of industrial pursuits to occupy millions of idle hands, 
which is refused to them even when they offer their services for life. 
Women, at least in the West, have no sort of occupation ; every farmer has 
children to place out, and when they are lucky enough to find in stores 
or hotels places for their daughters at $1 50 per week, they accept with 
joy. Not one of them selling corn at fourteen cents or sixteen cents a 
bushel, and his meat at $1 75 or $2 a cwt. has means to pay a work- 
man, and scarcely to dress his children decently. Lack of consumers 
and high freights, these are the causes of poverty in the midst of 
plenty. Let us see whether in this State sericulture would not be of 
some use, without caring whether the Japanese or Chinese are paid by 
ten cents or ten blows on the soles of their feet. 

It has been proven that one man can raise in a very limited space -a 
corner of his barn or his cottage— a hundred kilogrammes (a little over 
200 lbs.) of cocoons. To be quite within compass, let us give him four 
children. If there are four children, from the 1st of May to the 10th of 
June, on an acre of mulberries of good stock, these four children woidd 
pick 400 pounds of fresh cocoons. No doubt about it ; but then arises 
the question of the Silk Association in particular, and everybody in 
general. What will they do with it V Where's the market? A spinning 
factory cannot exist and flourish unless the country for forty or fifty 
miles can' supply an abundance of cocoons. 

It is not more than fifteen years pgo since the silk growers of the 
Cevennes, in France, were spinning their own cocoons, and they were 
in a prosperous condition. We might do the same here ; every farmer, 
for the sum of $5 or $10, might fit up a spinning wheel. His sixteen year 
old daughter could run it ; another of ten or twelve could tend the 
reel, and in three weeks they will run off four to six, then eight to ten 
ounces, a day of white or yellow cocoons of good quality. There we 
have three pounds a week. I will not put the price at $12 a pound 
(which was offered me in 1876), although the spinner, a Yankee girl, 
had had only two months' oractice. We had better put it at curient 
rates, say $6 50 a pound. The figures quoted by the association itself 
are $8 to $ 9 a pound. At this rate three pounds of silk will bring $27 
in money to the family stock. Ten or eleven pounds of fresh cocoons 
will make one pound of silk,- the same as three and a half to four 
pounds of dry cocoons. Thus 400 pounds of cocoons, picked by four 
children, four weeks, would give thirty-six to forty pounds of silk, or 
$360 in full. This would have employed two girls for nine or ten weeks 
under the mother's eye. I simply put these figures, and I need not ask 
fathers of families whether they would prefer this position to that 
which hard rimes imposes on them. 

When the production of cocoons is not enough to induce any one to 
start a factory, there certainly would be speculators who could esti- 
mate the cost of a small engine for heating the water for 300 basins, 
and do away with the hands of 300 or 400 boys almost by the same 
power. This would be self-evident when they remember that the de- 
fective cocoons and other waste are worth ait the lowest price $2 or 
$2 50 a kilogramme, and pay for a good deal of the labor. At first the 
spinner would have to gather his cocoons in small lots for perhaps 
hundreds of miles, and with a heavy charge for railroad fares. He 
would have to train workwomen that might waste stock and never be 
worth their teaching, or would leave him at last to go off and act as 
teachers in new shops. He might have a lot of apprentices to train, 
and his product would be inferior to that produced by more skillful 
hands. For these reasons it would be expedient that for the first ten 
years, whether the industry be in the hands of farmers or large capital- 



Rearing and Breeding 



ists, it should be protected by a tax on raw silk, the same as now on 
manufactured -silk, so that the manufacturer should pay a fair price 
for the raw material. Here the association would cry aloud, of course— 
we touch them to the quick. Then let us try another way. In place 
of duties, why not pay the silk raiser a premium of 80 cents to SSI for 
dry cocoons, or %\ to $1 50 for spun silk ? In this way the difficulty of 
encouraging production without injuring manufacturing would be 
avoided. 

And now for a word about the mulberry. 

The mulberry accompanies the vine to the highest range of tempera- 
ture. It will grow on any soil that is not swain py. In old times, only 
the black mulberry was known. ■ The old naturalists, Pliny and Dios- 
corides, make no mention of the white mulberry {moras alba). In l57o 
one Mercuriali, a physician of Forli, in Italy, attributed the tardy de- 
velopment of silk culture to their only having the black variety, of 
which the growth is slow and difficult and the siJk inferior. The white 
mulberry was introduced at Constantinople in 1552'. Thence by degrees 
it passed to Greece and Italy, and at last into France, where the ear- 
liest importations still exist. It is difficult to exaggerate the national 
importance of silk culture. 

En a work largely statistical, giving tables of exports and imports of 
raw and manufactured silk for the last half century, and bringing out 
clearly the steady growth of the silk manufacturing industry in this 
country, Professor Riley shows how, from 1740 to 1790, in the Southern 
and Middle States, the industry has flourished at times under the 
stimulus of State aid. He traces the causes of the failures, and the 
point is strongly brought out that they were transient, not permanent 
ones. 

Experiments that have been made in the past, and a series the author 
has been carrying on for the last ten years, establish the fact that the 
larger portion of the United States is admirably adapted to silk cul- 
ture. This is not only proved by the healthfulriess of the worms, but 
oy the fact that we have a larger number of silk-producing insects than 
any other country of the same extent, and that American" grown silk is 
of superior quality. Mr. Riley shows that the time has arrived for sys- 
tematic, intelligent effort in the line of silk raising. With a large 
tramp element, with a considerable portion of the population of the 
Eastern cities out of employment, etc.. the cheap labor argument can 
no longer be successfully made against silk culture. He concludes by 
advising Congress to build reeling mills, and the silk worm rearers 
not to plant any mulberry trees, but to raise the silk worms on Mac- 
lara, or hedge plant— osage orange. Strange to say, he argues as to 
whether we can compete with foreigners either in living as cheaply or 
producing as cheaply, and he recommends the osage orange exclu- 
sively as silk worms' food. He finds at first the means to make silk as 
dear' as possible, and to produce cocoons hardly worth reeling, that 
will not be bought at any rate by any experimental reeler, though I ad- 
mit that silk produced by osage fed cocoons is fine and good. But let 
us demonstrate Professor Riley's error— a very pardonable one, as it 
is the result of inexperience. 

All sericulturists recommend breeding on a small scale ; Professor 
Riley does, too. Let us fix by a given number what we understand 
by breeding on a small scale. 'In "Prance and Italy raising silk on a 
small scale signifies operations with from 20u to 800 or 1000 pounds of 
cocoons. Lai"ge breeders raise from 40 to 200 ounces of silk-worm eggs ; 
a great success to obtain 30 to 40 pounds per ounce, while the breeder of 
from 2 to 8 ounces of eggs seldom gets less than 80 pounds per ounce, 
and often 100 pounds or more. 

Now, take for example, a very small breeding-— say, four ounces of 
eggs, or about 100, d00 worms of first-rate breed. I suppose they will 
not give 500 pounds, as I have .got from such a quantity at Silkville 
only 400 pounds. I set this question : What quantity of leaves is needed 



of the Silk Worm. . 33 



for such a quantity of cocoons, and in how many meals or in how many 
days must they be picked ? 

Answer.— Fed on white ungrafted mulberry (Morus alba), one pound 
of cocoons eats up twenty pounds 'of leaves ; fed on Moretti, fourteen ; 
fed on. rose-leaf mulberry, a variety of the white, eighteen ; fed on 
Morus jacopnica, or mulberry lhou, fourteen or fifteen pounds of leaves 
make one pound of cocoons. Let us suppose the osage orange equal in 
quality to the Morus alba. We will need just four hundred times 
twenty pounds of leaves, say 8000 to re-open the crop, iiow it is a fact 
that from the hatching uutii three days after the fourth moulting, .the 
worm has consumed just half of the food he needs to be ready for spin- 
ning. At five to sis days for every molt, and three after the fourth, 
we have about twenty -three to 'twenty-seven days for picking 400; > 
pounds. Three days after the fourth moulting each quantity of worms 
representing 100 pounds needs 100 pounds of food from the Morus alba 
during two or three days, called in French, Les jours ties /raise, on 
grande %>resse (great hurrying time) ; then the appetite of the worm 
diminishes day after day. * For five days after the fourth moit they 
require 4000 pounds of leaves or 800 pounds a day. 

The mulberry and the rose allow a skilled man or boy to pick 100 to 
120 pounds per hour. I have and can do it myself. A man could easily 
pick on such trees all the food needed in the most busy time. His wife 
could feed, alone, the noon-time meal, and together they could feed the 
.evening meal just before supper. Thus a newly married couple, could 
raise 400 times 50 or 75 cents, the average price of the best cocoons that 
the United States can grow. 

I wonder how many pounds a day the same man would pick on hedge 
plant. If any picker knows it by experience I would gratefully receive 
his estimate, but I should not like to learn by experience. In conclu- 
sion, a commission of learned men and silk culturists was appointed by 
the French government, at the time when the disease which killed all 
the silk worms in Europe was in ail its fury, to investigate and prevent 
the scourge. There was then an opinion that the mulberry u'ee itself 
was sick, then the osage orange was tried, declared worthless, and set 
in rank very far after the muiticaulis of deceitful fame. 

As for the trees I speak of and other choice sorts, they have been 
created or introduced in China and Europe little by little, by grafting 
or by selecting the seeds ; some, as the lhou, are supposed hybrids, and 
represent 500 years of constant study and progress. The first axiom to 
be known by a silk grower is borrowed from Count de Gasparin, one of 
our most prominent writers on agriculture and silk culture : "The first 
thing to do for a silk grower is to cultivate the kinds of mulberry trees 
which give the larger quantity of silk for a given weight ; they produce 
the best, too," and are picked easier. Lessen your work and expenses, 
and increase the value of your crop. 

Among the thousands of varieties of mulberry trees I have introduced 
the four kinds hereafter described, which have been set in the first 
rank by all silk culturists for their excellent qualities. 

They are : The white mulberry tree. This kind furnishes a great 
number of varieties, and can be planted as standard, ornamental or 
forest tree as well as for a silk-producing tree, sound wood, beautiful 
leaves and sweet fruit. 

Eose-leafed mulberry tree ; a variety of the white which furnishes it- 
self many other, has larger and heavier leaves ; giving one pound of 
cocoons per eighteen pounds of its leaves, splendid as ornamental tree, 
not so good as the white as a forest tree ; it produces the finest silk 
known. 

The Moretti Elata does not degenerate by r seed, sustains the hardest 
winters better than any other kind. It is fit for standard, ornamental 
and forest tree. It grows straight up with an elegant shape and luxuri- 
ant foliage. As the white and the rose, it does not fear the grasshop- 
pers, rabbits and borers nor the many kinds of vermin which too often 

5 



34 Rearing and Breeding of the Silk Worm. 



ruin most of the trees in this country. It gives one pound of cocoons to 
every fourteen pounds of leaves. 

Medium trunks can be set from fourteen to sixteen feet apart ; dwarf 
four feet in a hedge, the rows being from twelve to fifteen feet apart. 

Moras Japonica, said lhou or Japanese mulberry tree. This kind 
was introduced in France by Camille Beauvais, and has the largest 
leaves, giving the same quantity of silk as the moretti. It is so easily 
picked that French breeders prefer to plant it to any other kind as a 
cheap silk producer. Its standing well the hard winters, is proved by 
five years' growth in Kansas. It grows so well by cuttings, that many 
stems grow eight feet high the first year in our Southern States. 

Plant them as dwarf trees, three feet in the row, the rows twelve feet 
distant. 

They can be planted from the first of October until the middle of 
May, and sometimes in June, after the leaves have been picked for the 
worms. 

The eggs of the silk worm must be free from disease, or failure is un- 
avoidable. 

A price of sixty cents or more will be offered by a society newly estab- 
lished, which will spread reeling factories throughout the United States, 
wherever they can And a supply of cocoons for making raw silk. 

It is reported, and I know by the inventor himself, that a new reel 
which reels with greater perfection and six times faster than any other 
known to this day, will be used by the company. 

Send stamps when you want an answer to your inquires, and details 
will be gladly given on the matter by 

Your obedient servant, 

L. S. CEOZIEE, 

Bayou Sara, La. 



A. TBEATI8E 



CCTLTUKE AND RAISING 



OF 



SILK WORMS 



A FEW HINTS 



FARMERS OF THE SOUTH. 



BY L. S. CRO 




COPYRIGHT SECURED 
L. S. CROZIEE. 



NEW ORLEANS: 

PRINTED AT THE DEMOCRAT OFFICE. 

1880. 



